MORE ON SAUDI ARABIA'S EYE-GOUGING AFFRONT
Saudi Arabia's corporal punishment of an eye for eye has already incurred international wrath and contempt. The incident involved is the plight of 34-year-old Puthan Veettil Naushad, hailing from Kerala, whose right eye is about to be gouged out in retribution for his role in a brawl in April 2003 in which a Saudi citizen lost his eye.
The gouging out is the eye-for-an-eye order of a sharia court of Dammam.The US rights group, Human Rights Watch, has rightly seen the order as an affront to human dignity and justice. It has rightly characterized the sentence as torture masquerading as justice.
It has asked King Abdullah to intervene and stop this barbaric punishment. Placing the issue in perspective, the rights watchdog has said the punishment is in violation of Saudi Arabia's obligations under international law.
Saudi Arabia had acceded to the convention against torture in 1997. Gouging out eyes cannot be anything but torture. Naushad's will be the third known instance of eye-gouging over the past year.
King Abdullah may know about the international convention against torture. The problem is the irrational men in Saudi's sharia courts are blind to such realities as international law. So, if their eye-gouging spree continues Saudi Arabia may gradually turn into a country of blind people.
Let this not happen, INSHA ALLAH!