Saudi Arabia sentenced five men to death and three others to prison for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi in a ruling that has been widely dismissed by experts.
The Washington Post columnist was killed in 2018 after walking into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul to obtain documents in order to marry his fiancée, Hatice Cengiz.
The murder generated international outrage and damaged Saudi Arabia’s international reputation.
Saudi Arabia’s public prosecutor announced the sentences on Monday but specified that a former adviser of the Saudi prince Saud al-Qahtani would not be charged.
Agnes Callamard, the UN expert who investigated the killing, called the ruling the “antithesis of justice” and a “mockery”.
“The hit-men are guilty, sentenced to death. The masterminds not only walk free. They have barely been touched by the investigation and the trial,” Callamard, the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions tweeted.
“That is the antithesis of Justice. It is a mockery.”
Why the sentence today is anything BUT Justice for #JamalKhashoggi: a) the hearings were held behind closed door even though none of the justification for holding a trial in camera under international law applied to this particular trial
— Agnes Callamard (@AgnesCallamard) December 23, 2019
Kenneth Roth, the director of Human Rights Watch, tweeted that “by potentially hanging lower-level operatives while letting off scot-free those who ordered the killing” the Saudi sentences showed that there needed to be an independent probe.
Meanwhile, Salah Khashoggi, one of the journalist’s two sons, said on Twitter: “We affirm our confidence in the Saudi judiciary at all levels, that we are fair and that we achieve justice.”
A U.S. official told Reuters that the trial of the killers as “an important step” towards holding those responsible for his death accountable.
“We encourage Saudi Arabia to continue with a fair and transparent judicial process,” the official, who declined to be named, said.