Anojan Sivarasa, a 24-year-old Sri Lankan migrant worker, was initially sentenced to five years in prison and fined three million Saudi riyals under Saudi Arabia's cybercrime law for a Facebook comment deemed blasphemous. On September 17, prosecutors asked for him to be tried under Sharia law instead, and an appeals court subsequently increased his sentence to death. Saudi authorities have not yet set an execution date.
This image shows Anojaan Sivarasa, whose case is described in the article as a migrant worker sentenced to death for a Facebook comment.
According to The Mirror US, the comment that led to his case was reportedly screenshotted and passed to Saudi authorities and to his employer, which resulted in his arrest in July. His family says they have not heard from him since September 28.
The case has prompted international concern: Humanists U.K. launched a petition urging the British government to press Saudi officials to overturn the sentence, with its chief executive Andrew Copson stating that 'everyone has the right to speak freely about religion, and no one should ever face punishment for doing so, much less be put to death.' Simultaneously, the Sri Lankan government is seeking a pardon, with President Anura Kumara Dissanayake having met the family and promised governmental action, including sending a four-person legal delegation to Saudi Arabia. Pressure has also built domestically, as religious leaders and civil society groups in Sri Lanka have demanded intervention and Buddhist and Hindu leaders sent a memo to the presidential secretariat. Sivarasa's brother, Hamsidan, told the BBC Sinhala that the family contacted the Sri Lankan embassy once communication ceased and that individuals in Sri Lanka had emailed the company where his brother worked.
While human rights groups have long criticized Saudi Arabia for imposing harsh punishments for online speech, they note that executions for blasphemy are believed to be less common than those for drug crimes or murder. The exact content of Sivarasa's Facebook comment has not been disclosed in the available reports, leaving unresolved questions about what specifically triggered the legal proceedings. Additionally, no execution date has been set, leaving the timing of any potential carrying out of the sentence uncertain.