Lebanon:  The authorities in Saudi Arabia on Friday began the public flogging of a blogger who was sentenced to 1,000 blows, 10 years in prison and a large fine for starting a website that featured content critical of the country’s religious establishment, the rights group Amnesty International reported.

The floggings are to be administered with a cane over a period of months.

The blogger, Raif Badawi, was arrested after starting a website called “Free Saudi Liberals,” and was later convicted of charges that included cybercrime and parental disobedience, reported ndtv.com.

The case has drawn attention to the strict limits on freedom of expression in Saudi Arabia, a close Arab ally of the United States, and prompted unusually direct criticism from the U.S. government.

Jen Psaki, a State Department spokeswoman, told reporters Thursday that the United States was concerned that Badawi would face “the inhumane punishment of a thousand lashes in addition to serving a 10-year sentence in prison for exercising his rights to freedom of expression and religion.”

The U.S. government called on Saudi Arabia to cancel the flogging and “review Badawi’s case and sentence,” Psaki said.

Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy, has used its courts in the past to punish dissidents or those who question the country’s strict interpretation of Islam. Often, these actions face no public rebuke from the United States, which considers Saudi Arabia an important ally in the fight against terrorism and other areas.

Besides being the world’s largest oil exporter, the kingdom is one of five Arab countries that have joined a U.S.-led air campaign against the jihadis of the Islamic State.

Badawi was arrested in 2012 and prosecuted in a criminal court for offenses that included cybercrime and disobeying his father, who has denounced his son in the news media.

Prosecutors tried and failed to charge him with apostasy and then pressed for a resentencing because they considered his first sentence of seven years in prison and 600 blows too lenient.

Last year, Badawi received his final sentence of 10 years in prison, a fine of more than a quarter-million dollars and 1,000 blows with the cane.

An unidentified witness cited by Amnesty said Badawi was taken from a bus and flogged 50 times in a public square outside of a mosque in the port city of Jiddah after Friday prayer. About 15 minutes later, he was put back on the bus and taken away. Amnesty said it would not identify the witness because of security concerns.

Adam Coogle, a Middle East researcher for Human Rights Watch, said Badawi was clearly being punished for starting a liberal website and insulting the religious authorities.

He said that floggers in Saudi Arabia are supposed to distribute the blows from the top of the back to the back of the legs without breaking the skin. It is not a bloody affair, but it is public and painful.

“It is viewed as much as a humiliation as it is a physical punishment,” Coogle said, adding that the lack of blood did not make it painless.

“You are left very sore by this,” he said.