Hezbollah Slams Saudi Execution of Sheikh Nimr as "Assassination"
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Lebanon's Hezbollah resistance movement condemned the execution of a prominent Shiite cleric in Saudi Arabia on Saturday, calling it an "assassination".
The "real reason" for the execution was "that Sheikh Nimr... demanded the squandered rights of an oppressed people," the movement said in a statement.
The statement was also quoted by Hezbollah's official al Manar television and Lebanon-based Al Mayadeen TV.
Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr along with 47 others were executed on Saturday. Sheikh Nimr, a critic of the Riyadh regime, was shot by Saudi police and arrested in 2012 in the Qatif region of Shiite-dominated Eastern Province, which was the scene of peaceful anti-regime demonstrations at the time.