Saudi Arabia on Monday executed a Yemeni man accused of plotting a suicide attack in the kingdom and of links to the Islamic State jihadist group, the interior ministry said. The wealthy Gulf country, with one of the world’s highest execution rates, has been the target of a series of deadly IS shootings and bombings since late 2014. “Mohammed al-Saddam, a Yemeni national, sought to target civilian gatherings at a public facility under the instructions of the Daesh terrorist organisation,” the interior ministry said in a statement, referring to IS by its Arabic acronym. “The death sentence was carried on Monday in the city of Riyadh.” It said the man had “pledged allegiance to IS” and was planning a “suicide attack using an explosive belt”, without elaborating on the case or when the Yemeni was arrested. The Saudi authorities could not immediately be reached for comment. The number of executions had dropped significantly in 2020, partly due to a moratorium on executions of people sentenced to death for drug trafficking. But Amnesty International said in August that at least 40 people were executed this year between January and July in Saudi Arabia, more than for the whole of 2020.