'Adulterous' Saudi princess granted UK asylum feared death by flogging and stoning

London, July 21 (ANI): The Saudi Arabian princess, who is in secret British asylum after giving birth to an illegitimate child, told the British Asylum Tribunal that her country's law would award her killing by flogging and stoning if she was made to return home.

The young woman, who has a love child with a British man, won her claim for refugee status after telling a judge that her adulterous affair made her liable to death by stoning under Sharia law, The Telegraph reports.

The woman, who comes from a very wealthy Saudi family, says she met her English boyfriend - who is not a Muslim - during a visit to London.

She became pregnant the following year and worried that her elderly husband - a member of the Royal Family of Saudi Arabia - had become suspicious of her behaviour, but persuaded him to let her visit the UK again to give birth in secret.

She persuaded the court that if she returned to the Gulf state she and her child would be subject to capital punishment under Sharia law, the report said.

Since she fled Saudi Arabia, her family and her husband's family have broken off contact with her.

Her case is one of a small number of claims for asylum brought by citizens of Saudi Arabia, which are not openly acknowledged by either government.

Both, the British Home Office and the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia in London, have declined to comment on the issue, the report added.

According to Amnesty International, there were at least 102 executions of men and women by stonings, floggings, beheadings and hangings last year and the charity claims there are at least 136 more people on death row. (ANI)