Tasnim � Senior Iranian cleric Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi deplored the international organizations� silence on the mass execution of 37 political prisoners in Saudi Arabia.

�A number of Muslims in Saudi Arabia, including pure Shiites, have been mercilessly martyred by the Al Saud regime without any trial and special reason,� Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi said in a speech in the central city of Qom on Saturday.

This mass execution is only a small part of the Saudi regime's crimes against humanity, the cleric added.

He further decried the international organizations� silence on the issue and said if one of the 37 executions had occurred in Iran, all the global circles would have raised a hue and cry.

Saudi Arabia�s interior ministry said it executed 37 people, mostly Shiites, in connection with �terrorism� crimes, a report said.

The death penalty was implemented... on a number of culprits for adopting extremist terrorist ideologies and forming terrorist cells to corrupt and disrupt security as well as spread chaos and provoke sectarian strife,� the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said on Tuesday citing a statement issued by the ministry.

A media report also said on Friday that some victims of the Saudi mass execution made impassioned pleas to the courts that their confessions were false and obtained under torture in a bid to save their lives but were still beheaded.

Many said they were totally innocent, that their confessions had been written by the same people who had tortured them. Some claimed to have evidence of their abuse at the hands of their interrogators.