JEDDAH, 8 March 2003 — The Australian media has been whipped into a frenzy at the news that one of its nationals, 56-year-old Robert Thomas, has been flogged after being found guilty of breaking the Kingdom’s laws.
And it has emerged that a second Australian, an unnamed 38-year-old who hails from Queensland, is awaiting sentencing for alcohol smuggling — and he, too, could be flogged if found guilty.
Thomas is currently a serving 16-month sentence and has received 300 lashes for his involvement in the theft of medical equipment, a crime for which his Filipino wife was also arrested.
News of the floggings in particular has resulted in outrage in Australia, where anti-Islamic sentiment is already strong because of a terrorist attack in Bali attributed to “Muslim extremists” in which many Australians died and a highly-publicized “gang rape” case in which the perpetrators were Muslim.
Australian talkback radio has been inundated by angry calls, and Sydney’s influential, mass-circulation Daily Telegraph featured a front page picture of a man receiving a public flogging under the heading: “The barbaric punishment inflicted on an innocent Australian.” Underneath was the headline “300 LASHES”.
What the Australian media have overlooked is that Thomas was tried and convicted in a Saudi court and sentenced under the Kingdom’s Shariah law. All foreign nationals who come to live in the Kingdom are subject to its laws, and those who break the law are sentenced as any Saudi would be. Their embassies and employers make this clear to them before they arrive.
Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has reported that embassy officials have been in contact with Thomas and his condition was reported as being “all right”.
“In terms of the beatings, whilst they were painful, the real point was that they were profoundly degrading,” Downer also said.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard has described the floggings by Saudi authorities as “cruel and appallingly inhumane”.
And herein lies the rub.
What the Australian media and government have also overlooked is the exact nature of the so-called floggings, hinted at in the fact that Thomas is “all right” despite having received 300 of them.
If they had in fact been real “lashings”, the man would not have been “all right”.
“The reason the punishment is meted out in public is not to humiliate, but to serve as a deterrent,” Adil Salahi, an expert in Shariah law, told Arab News.
“During a flogging, the man inflicting the punishment is required under Shariah law to keep his elbow at his side and only use his wrist in a flicking motion so as not to cause too much pain.”
One method that is used to ensure that the elbow does not leave the side, he explains, is to hold a copy of the Qu’ran under his arm.
“If the person receiving the punishment is in poor health, or at risk of death from the punishment itself, the person inflicting the punishment is required to hold 10 canes and count each stroke as 10,” Salahi adds.
Speaking of the arrest and possible imposition of a punishment of flogging on the second Australian in custody, a Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spokeswoman told reporters: “Of course, we’ll make representations if he’s sentenced to floggings. The government will again try to intervene.”
