Man saved from 7-year jail after converting to Islam

A Saudi court of appeals scrapped a seven-year jail sentence against an Indian man accused of defaming the Grand Mosque after converting to Islam in prison.

The unnamed man had earlier been found guilty of publishing pictures and statements on Facebook defaming Islam’s holiest shrine and was sentenced to seven years in prison and ordered lashed 2,100 times in separate batches. He was also fined SR30,000 (Dh30,000) and had his mobile phone seized.

“The appeals court cancelled that sentenced and decided to release the defendant after he converted to Islam inside prison,” Ajel daily said in a report from the Western Red Sea port of Jeddah.