RIYADH: Saudi authorities on Sunday beheaded a Pakistani in the Muslim holy city of Mecca for stabbing to death a compatriot, the interior ministry said. Altaf Hussein Hati was found guilty of stabbing a man in the throat and leaving him to bleed to death, the ministry said in a statement carried by SPA state news agency.

His beheading brings to 74 the number of people executed so far this year in the conservative kingdom, where 79 were put to death in 2011, according to Amnesty International.

Rape, murder, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking are all punishable by death under the sharia, or Islamic law.