section_path: Government and politics/Human rights
section_name: Human rights
paragraph_text: Human rights
  
  The Saudi government, which mandates Muslim and non-Muslim observance of Sharia law under the absolute rule of the House of Saud, has been denounced by various international organizations and governments for violating human rights within the country. The authoritarian regime is consistently ranked among the "worst of the worst" in Freedom House 's annual survey of political and civil rights. According to Amnesty International, security forces continue to torture and ill-treat detainees to extract confessions to be used as evidence against them at trial. Saudi Arabia abstained from the United Nations vote adopting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, saying it contradicted Sharia. Mass executions, such as those carried out in 2016, in 2019, and in 2022, have been condemned by international rights groups.
  
  Since 2001, Saudi Arabia has engaged in widespread internet censorship. Most online censorship generally falls into two categories: one based on censoring "immoral" (mostly pornographic and LGBT-supportive websites along with websites promoting any religious ideology other than Sunni Islam) and one based on a blacklist run by Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Media, which primarily censors websites critical of the Saudi regime or associated with parties that are opposed to or opposed by Saudi Arabia.
  
  Saudi Arabian law does not recognize sexual orientations or religious freedom, and the public practice of non-Muslim religions is actively prohibited. The justice system regularly engages in capital punishment, which has included public executions by beheading. In line with Sharia in the Saudi justice system, the death penalty can theoretically be imposed for a wide range of offenses, including murder, rape, armed robbery, repeated drug use, apostasy, adultery, witchcraft and sorcery, and can be carried out by beheading with a sword, stoning or firing squad, followed by crucifixion (exposure of the body after execution). In 2022, the Saudi Crown Prince stated that capital punishments will be removed "except for one category mentioned in the Quran", namely homicide, under which certain conditions must be applied. In April 2020, Saudi Supreme Court issued a directive to eliminate the punishment of flogging from the Saudi court system, replaced by imprisonment or fines.
  
  Historically, Saudi women faced discrimination in many aspects of their lives and under the male guardianship system were effectively treated as legal minors. The treatment of women had been referred to as " sex segregation " and "gender apartheid ". As of June 2023, the kingdom has reportedly reversed its ban on women "becoming lawyers, engineers, or geologists" and established "aggressive affirmative action programs", doubling the female labour force participation rate. It has added "its first female newspaper editors, diplomats, TV anchors and public prosecutors", with a female head of the Saudi stock exchange and member on the board of Saudi Aramco. In addition, on June 24th, 2018, the Saudi government issued a law officially allowing women to drive.
  
  Saudi Arabia is a notable destination country for men and women trafficked for the purposes of slave labour and commercial sexual exploitation. Migrants from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East are employed in the country's construction, hospitality, and domestic work sectors under the kafala system which human rights groups say is linked to abuses including modern slavery.