Minister accused of abject U-turn on Saudi torture comments

The government has been accused of being "spineless" after a Foreign Office minister, who last week told MPs Saudi Arabia had "clearly" tortured a man on death row, has asked for his words to be struck from the record.

David Rutley now says he spoke in "error" when he called Saudi treatment of Hussein Abo al-Kheir "abhorrent."

He has asked the parliamentary authorities to change his words.

Reprieve said it was "an abject u-turn...on a vital matter of principle".

The campaign group said Mr al-Kheir was innocent but "may be executed at any time."

The 57-year-old, who has eight children, has been on death row in Saudi Arabia since 2015. His family say he has been told his death sentence may be carried out within days.

The Jordanian national was arrested by Saudi border police in 2014, who said they had found a quantity of pills in his car and accused him of drug smuggling.

'Hypersensitivity'

Mr al-Kheir says he was detained for 12 days, strung up by his feet, beaten, not given a lawyer, and his torture only stopped when he signed a fake confession.

Last week in the House of Commons Mr Rutley was asked an Urgent Question about a recent surge in executions in Saudi Arabia and Mr al-Kheir's treatment in particular.

Mr Rutley told MPs: "We have already expressed our concerns, particularly about Mr al-Kheir's case, in which clearly torture was used.

"We find that abhorrent. We have raised that issue at the highest level and will continue to do so."

However, he has since written to Hansard, Parliament's record-keepers, to say he spoke in "error" and asked for the record to be corrected to say that in Mr al-Kheir's case "torture has been alleged".

The reference to Saudi Arabia's treatment being "abhorrent" was withdrawn entirely.

Conservative MP David Davis, who posed the Urgent Question, told the BBC: "Nobody of any sense denies the Saudis torture people."

He said the move to change the record showed "hypersensitivity" in the Foreign Office which, he said, did not want to harm diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia.

Speaking in the Commons last week Mr Davis said: "Saudi Arabia has executed 20 people for drugs-related offences in just two weeks. We believe there are 55 other people currently at risk of the death penalty."

'Troubling questions'

The Labour MP Hilary Benn - who Mr Rutley was responding to when he described Saudi Arabia's behaviour as "abhorrent" - said "given the widespread reports that torture is regularly used in Saudi Arabia to gain confessions from prisoners, including in Hussein abo al-Kheir's case, the government must speak out and condemn its use."

Maya Foa, the director of Reprieve, asked "what happened to change the government's mind? At the very least, going back on the minister's principled declaration looks spineless. At worst, it raises extremely troubling questions about Saudi influence at the highest levels of UK government."

Reprieve is calling for a stay of execution for Mr al-Kheir. It says the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found the deprivation of his liberty "lacks a legal basis".

In a report released in October the UN group recommended Saudi Arabia "quash his death sentence and immediately and unconditionally release him."

The Foreign Office, when approached to explain why the change was made, said it could only point to the amended parliamentary record.

On the use of torture it said "we have raised that issue at the highest levels and will continue to do so, not just in [Mr al-Kheir's] case but in other cases in which that might be happening as well."