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Saudi Arabia has reached a new high for executions in a single year, after authorities announced that three individuals were put to death on Monday. With these latest executions, the total number carried out in 2025 has risen to 340, surpassing last year’s record and placing the kingdom behind only China and Iran globally in the use of capital punishment.
This marks the second consecutive year that Saudi Arabia has exceeded its previous annual execution record since rights organizations began systematically tracking such data in the 1990s. In 2024, the country carried out 338 executions.
According to a statement from the interior ministry published by the state-run Saudi Press Agency (SPA), the three most recent executions took place in the Mecca region and were linked to murder convictions.
Official tallies based on ministry and SPA reports show that 232 of the 340 executions in 2025 were for drug-related offenses, making up the majority of cases. Observers attribute the sharp increase largely to the government’s intensified “war on drugs,” launched in 2023. Many of those now being executed were arrested during the early stages of this campaign and have since gone through legal proceedings. Saudi Arabia reinstated capital punishment for drug crimes in late 2022, following a suspension of nearly three years.
The kingdom, the largest economy in the Arab world, is also a major destination for captagon, a synthetic stimulant that, according to the United Nations, was Syria’s largest export under former president Bashar al-Assad, who was removed from power last year. Since initiating its anti-drug campaign, Saudi Arabia has expanded police checkpoints on highways and at border crossings, seizing millions of pills and arresting dozens of suspected traffickers. To date, foreign nationals appear to be disproportionately affected.
Saudi Arabia continues to face international criticism over its reliance on the death penalty, which human rights groups describe as excessive and inconsistent with the country’s efforts to project a modern, reform-oriented image.
“These are not violent offenders, and most are foreign citizens,” said Harriet McCulloch of the rights organization Reprieve. “Executing them violates international standards, which restrict the death penalty to cases of intentional killing.”
Activists argue that the continued use of capital punishment undermines Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 agenda, which aims to portray Saudi Arabia as a more open and tolerant society. As part of this strategy, the kingdom is investing heavily in tourism, infrastructure, and global sporting events, including the 2034 World Cup, in an effort to reduce its dependence on oil revenues.
Saudi authorities, however, maintain that capital punishment is essential for preserving public safety and insist that executions are only carried out after all legal appeals have been fully exhausted.
Amnesty International has tracked executions in Saudi Arabia since 1990, noting that earlier figures are difficult to verify. The organization reports that Saudi Arabia ranked as the world’s third-largest executor in 2022, 2023, and 2024, behind only China and Iran.
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