Hawzah News Agency (Qatif - Saudi Arabia) - The Supreme Court of Saudi Arabia has sentenced an imprisoned political dissident from the oil-rich Eastern Province to life in prison.

Human rights sources, requesting anonymity, said the court passed the ruling against Mustafa al-Khayyat over his active participation in protests in the Shia-majority Qatif region since 2011, the Arabic-language Mirat al-Jazeera news website reported.

The sources added that the court has initially handed down the death sentence to Khayyat, a local resident of Tarout Island, following a number of hearings that started in July 2017.

The report further noted that the sentence was issued on the basis of confessions extracted under duress.

This comes after on February 24, a court in Saudi Arabia sentenced one Saudi citizen to death and seven others to jail on trumped-up charges of treason and spying for Iran.