DUBAI, 9 January — A top British diplomat has raised the case of five Britons detained in the Kingdom for alcohol-related offenses with several senior Saudi officials in Riyadh, a British Embassy spokeswoman said yesterday.
The spokeswoman also said British diplomats, who had visited four of the jailed Britons, were still waiting to see the fifth.
"Sir John Kerr has discussed the issue with Saudi officials. I cannot tell you what was said in the discussions," the spokeswoman told Reuters by telephone from Riyadh.
She said among the officials met by Kerr, who has ended his three-day visit to Saudi Arabia, were Riyadh Governor Prince Salman and Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal.
British officials said last week the five Britons had been arrested over offenses related to alcohol, which is strictly banned in Saudi Arabia.
Punishment for alcohol offenses applied in Saudi Arabia could range from jail sentences to flogging and deportation, Saudi sources say. It was not clear if the five Britons have been charged.
A Saudi newspaper last month linked a series of car bombings that killed one Briton and injured six others in Saudi Arabia in November and December to illegal activities like the distribution of alcohol.
The five men were arrested in Riyadh between Oct. 16 -- a month before the first car bombing -- and Dec. 8. They were being held in two separate jails.
One Briton was killed and his wife injured in the first attack in Riyadh in November. A few days later another bomb injured three Britons and an Irish woman. In December a fruit juice carton placed near the windscreen of a car exploded, injuring another Briton in the eastern town of Alkhobar.
No one has claimed responsibility for the bombings. Saudi Arabia says it has detained several suspects in connection with one or more of the attacks.
