Sri Lankan national beheaded, crucified in Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia has put the bodies of four Sri Lankans beheaded in Riyadh on display in public in an effort to deter a rising crime wave by foreigners, Saudi media reported.
International rights groups have often accused the conservative kingdom, a key US ally, of applying draconian and arbitrary justice, beheading murderers, rapists and drug traffickers in public by the sword.
The desert kingdom, which is home to Islam's holiest shrines, says it applies strict Islamic law.
The Sri Lankan gang were executed at a public square in a busy market district of the city of four million.
Saudi media said that although no one was killed in the series of robberies they were convicted of, the four men were given the death sentence due to the organised nature of the violent hold-ups, raising fears of foreign mafias.
Al-Riyadh newspaper said the men were "crucified" - tied to wooden beams after beheading - as part of moves to deter other expatriates from crime.
"There is a pressing need to review many of the negative practices of foreigners in the kingdom," al-Riyadh quoted Abdel-Rahman al-Luweiheq, who teaches at the Imam bin Saud University, as saying.
"Foreigners in the kingdom are implementing criminal plans made abroad," he said, referring to mafia-like outfits.
Almost one third of Saudi Arabia's population of 24 million people are foreigners, mostly blue-collar workers from Asia.
Most are tied to Saudi employers who usually take their passports as a way of controlling their movements and behaviour, a system rights groups says deprives expatriates of rights.
A Sri Lankan embassy spokesman expressed shock that the sentence was implemented despite appeals to spare them.
"We are shocked, we never expected any of this," the spokesman said. "We made an appeal asking for clemency."
Saudi newspapers regularly carry reports about busted drug, alcohol and prostitution rackets, often involving African and Asian residents in the Red Sea city of Jeddah.