Raif Badawi: Wife urges international community to end floggings

The wife of Raif Badawi, a Saudi blogger sentenced to 10 years in jail and 1,000 lashes for co-founding a liberal website, has said the punishment is too much for anyone to cope with, and is psychological as well as physical torture.

She said it was "painfully horrible" to imagine what was happening to her husband.

Speaking to the BBC from Canada, where she and her children have been granted asylum, Ensaf Haidar said she would like international governments to do more to help.

Mr Badawi's public flogging started on Friday when was led into a square and given the first instalment of 50 lashes.