WITH 33 people known to have lost their heads so far this year to the executioner's righteous sword, it cannot be said that Saudi Arabia is a sissy about justice. But just to make sure, the kingdom's rulers are making its laws even tougher.

In January the government stretched existing draconian rules regulating the printed press to cover the internet, including blog sites. Then, in April, it announced sweeping amendments to those rules. The almost comically restrictive law now threatens fat fines and summary closure of any organ that dares to commit such breaches as “inciting divisions between citizens”, “damaging the country's public affairs”, or insulting senior clerics, among a long list of other no-no's. Individual malefactors may be barred indefinitely from writing in any publication or appearing in electronic media.

Yet Saudi lawmakers now seem set on cooking up even stronger stuff. A draft law before the kingdom's all-appointed proto-parliament, the Shura Council, threatens a blistering array of punishments for anyone remotely suspected of financing or engaging in “terrorism”. They may be held incommunicado and without charge for 120 days before being put before a special court that could impose further months of detention. Anyone convicted of causing death would be executed. Yet the definition of terrorism extends to such vague things as “endangering national unity” and “harming the interests of the state”.

Amnesty International, which released the leaked document, reckons that the wording is so sweeping that it would “in effect criminalise legitimate dissent.” Particularly striking is a provision that could impose jail terms of ten years or more on anyone questioning the integrity of the king or crown prince, both of whom currently happen to be ailing octogenarians.

More than the threat implied by such terminology, however, what worries sensible Saudis is that it bears the imprimatur of a probable future king. Prince Nayef, feared since 1975 as the country's minister of interior, also holds the position of second deputy prime minister, traditionally the runner-up spot for kingship. With his half-brother, King Abdullah, and his full brother, Crown Prince Sultan, likely to leave the scene soon, Prince Nayef's accession appears all but assured. This is a man who denied for months after the 9/11 attacks on America that any Saudis had been involved, but then pursued a campaign to crush al-Qaeda within the kingdom that led to thousands of arrests. While other Arabs are vigorously demanding greater freedom, Saudis may—at least for a while—have to settle for rather less.