TV presenter gets death sentence for 'sorcery'

[AsahinaKimi]

(CNN) -- Amnesty International is calling on Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah to stop the execution of a Lebanese man sentenced to death for "sorcery."

In a statement released Thursday, the international rights group condemned the verdict and demanded the immediate release of Ali Hussain Sibat, former host of a popular call-in show that aired on Sheherazade, a Beirut based satellite TV channel.

According to his lawyer, Sibat, who is 48 and has five children, would predict the future on his show and give out advice to his audience.

The attorney, May El Khansa, who is in Lebanon, tells CNN her client was arrested by Saudi Arabia's religious police (known as the Mutawa'een) and charged with sorcery while visiting the country in May 2008. Sibat was in Saudi Arabia to perform the Islamic religious pilgrimage known as Umra.

Sibat was then put on trial. In November 2009, a court in the Saudi city of Medina found Sibat guilty and sentenced him to death.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/meast/03/19/saudi.arabia.sorcery/index.html?hpt=T2

[GodlessBiker]

1. Collect call for Saudi Arabia from the Dark Ages, will you accept the charges? Yep.

[RaleighNCDUer]

4. yeah, well, they aren't the only ones.

Last night I heard a teabagger being interviewed on the radio, and as he was finishing up he started chanting about Obama's last day "January 20, 1213".

I KNEW they were stick in the middle-ages.

[Subdivisions]

2. Barbarians. We should invade them and take their oil. n/t

[EFerrari]

3. You'd think a producer would have figured this out before pitching the show. n/t

[Tailormyst]

7. He lives and works in lebanon.

He was just visiting Saudia Arabia. At least that is what I gained from the article. Mulsims will think twice before making their pilgrimage to a place that will execute them for living legal lives in their own countries. It is almost at the top of my "never visit" list.

[TexasObserver]

5. If they like you, you're a prophet. If they don't, you're a sorcerer.

[BadgerKid]

6. Sibat should become an economist here.

:sarcasm:

[Stevenmarc]

8. Sorcery? Thank God FOX isn't over there since they pull shit out of thin air

[Matariki]

9. It must be hell to live an a place with 'religious police'

poor man.

[Liberal In Texas]

10. One would expect nothing less from a despotic kingdom that is good pals with the Bush family. n/t

[dembotoz]

11. aw shoot, I thought perhaps glenn beck