A Disproportionate Risk of Being Executed: Why Pakistani Migrants Are Vulnerable to Capital Punishment in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Abstract Many labour migrants in the Arab Gulf countries are from South Asia. Necessary to local economies, they enjoy few rights and protections from host states, particularly when accused of serious crimes. Our original empirical data suggests a disproportionate number of Pakistanis sentenced to death and executed in Saudi Arabia and we explore explanations within a wider discussion of the place and experiences of South Asian migrants in the Gulf. Our data suggest that drug laws and penal policies leave migrant workers particularly susceptible to capital punishment, with the administration of migrant employment recruitment processes exposing Pakistanis to coercion into drug trafficking such that some could be regarded not as criminally liable but as victims of human trafficking.