26 Aug 22 | Opinion, Ruth's blog, Saudi Arabia
I love working at Index but it isn’t always an emotionally easy place to work. Every day my team and I are exposed to some of the most heartbreaking stories of human rights abuses around the world. We routinely have to read the details of toture, persecution, detention and murder and whilst we try not to become immune to the daily horrors – sometimes that is the only way to do our jobs.
However there will always be a case that makes us collectively stop. A person’s story that makes us feel impotent. That touches our hearts. That demands even more from us. That personifies the reason why Index was established in the first place – and sometimes it won’t be the most graphic of cases – but rather one so unjust we cannot move on.
And that happened again this month.
There has been limited media coverage about Salma al-Shehab. An academic, a PhD student at the University of Leeds. A wife, a mother of two and a Saudi citizen. She also happened to occasionally use Twitter to support the plight of women in Saudi and to call on those dissidents and clerics who had been detained to be released. She isn’t a leading political activist or a leading light of a human rights organisation – her PhD is in medicine.
Last year Salma returned to Saudi on holiday and was immediately arrested, tried and convicted by a terrorism tribunal of aiding dissidents seeking to “disrupt public order” and publishing “false rumours”. Her initial sentence was six years in detention. However this month, after an appeal, her sentence has been increased to 34 years followed by a 34-year restriction on travel. For the ‘crime’ of occasionally using social media while in the UK to highlight the detention of others in Saudi Arabia, she will be held in a Saudi prison until she is 68 years old and will not be allowed to leave Saudi Arabia again until she is 102.
This is the longest sentence ever issued by a Saudi court for a peaceful activist. To all intents and purposes it is little short of a death sentence. For the crime of using social media.
Salma deserves more than the words of protest that come from Index and others, although we do protest her arrest and are horrified by her treatment. She deserves her liberty. She has been imprisoned for using her voice, when in a democratic country, to defend others who no longer are able to be heard. She acted in the best traditions of a dissident.
So from here on in, Index will seek to use its voice to raise hers. We will not let the world forget her, as she sits in a Saudi prison.
On the 15th of every month (she was initially arrested on 15 January 2021), we will tell her story. Shining a light on her plight. And in the coming months we will work with partners both in the UK and across the world to make sure her case doesn’t get forgotten as just another case of human rights abuse by Saudi Arabia.
17 Aug 22 | News and features, Saudi Arabia
Photo: Instagram
Index on Censorship has expressed its concern over the unwarranted prison sentence of 34 years handed out to Saudi national Salma al-Shehab, who was a student at the University of Leeds in the UK at the time of her alleged crimes – tweeting in support of prisoners of conscience and retweeting statements of support of the Saudi activist Loujain Alhathloul.
Al-Shehab, who was studying for a PhD in oral and human health, was arrested on 15 January 2021 after going back to Saudi Arabia to spend the holiday with her husband and two children, Adam and Noah (right). It is understood she was planning to return to the UK with her family.
She was questioned for almost a year before being charged by the Specialised Criminal Court under various parts of the country’s Counter-Terrorism Law and the Anti-Cybercrime Law for “supporting those seeking to disrupt public order, undermining the safety of the general public and stability of the state, and publishing false and tendentious rumours on Twitter”, according to the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GC4HR).
Al-Shehab was initially handed a six-year sentence last year but on appeal this was increased to 34 years, including a discretionary five years added by the judge. She has also been slapped with a travel ban for a further 34 years following her sentence.
The GC4HR says the sentence is the longest ever given to a peaceful activist.
Jemimah Steinfeld, editor-in-chief of Index on Censorship, said: “Index condemns the 34-year sentence passed on Salma Al-Shehab and calls for her immediate and unconditional release. The decision of the Saudi authorities to charge Salma for merely retweeting other people’s tweets while at university in the UK is yet another example of the growing trend of authoritarian governments to apply their draconian laws beyond their own borders.”
She added: “We fear we are sleep-walking into a situation where no one is safe from any law, no matter where in the world they are, and we call on the international community to unite in their condemnation of her sentencing. Using your voice to dissent should not be a crime, nor should supporting others who do.”
One of Al-Shehab’s supposed crimes was to tweet about prisoners of conscience and to retweet tweets relating to the Saudi women’s rights defender Loujain Alhathloul, one of six jailed people that Index supported in our 2020 end of year campaign. Alhathloul was eventually released in 2021.
In a pinned tweet, published on 30 August 2019, al-Shehab said, “I reject injustice, and support the oppressed…. Freedom for prisoners of conscience and for all the oppressed in the world.”
Loujain’s sister Lina Alhathloul, head of monitoring and communications for ALQST, an independent NGO established in 2014 by Saudi Arabian human rights defender Yahya Assiri, said: “This appalling sentence makes a mockery of the Saudi authorities’ claims of reform for women and of the legal system, and shows that they remain hellbent on harshly punishing anyone who expresses their opinions freely. Saudi activists warned Western leaders that giving legitimacy to the crown prince would pave the way for more abuses, which is unfortunately what we are witnessing now.”
The organisation said it feared al-Shehab’s sentence “may be the start of a new trend that the Saudi authorities will follow in the days ahead, as a mechanism for punishing all who criticise either their domestic or foreign policies”.
It added: “This is of particular concern now that normal diplomatic relations have been restored between Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and other world leaders, after having been strained since the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi on the crown prince’s orders.
28 Apr 21 | Magazine, Magazine Editions, Volume 50.01 Spring 2021
Author
Ma Jian is an award-winning Chinese writer. His latest novel is China Dream. His work is banned in China
Singer
Gelareh Sheibani was born in Iran and took keyboard lessons as a youngter. She found a passion for singing in her teenage years but solo singing in the country was not permitted. After the release of the video for her song Nagoo Tanhaei and the follow-up she was arrested and prosecuted. She later left the country and now lives in Turkey
Journalist
Sarah Sands is Chair of the Gender Equality Advisory Council for G7 and a board member of Index on Censorship. Sands was the former editor of BBC’s Today programme
12 Feb 21 | Opinion, Ruth's blog, Saudi Arabia
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]One thousand and one days.
Twenty-four thousand and twenty-four hours.
One million, four hundred and forty-one thousand, four hundred and forty minutes.
It’s almost impossible to imagine. Sitting in a cell, in horrendous conditions, knowing that as a woman you are especially vulnerable in a Saudi jail – a target for abuse and harassment. Whippings and electric shocks are a regular part of your day-to-day life. Your family are barred from visiting for months at a time and every move you make is being monitored and reported on. You’re battered and bruised.
Every time you show dissent another charge added to your ‘crimes’. And that’s before accounting for the fear of contracting Covid, of knowing that your health and wellbeing is the last thing in the world your captors care about.
But that’s been the life that Loujain al-Hathloul has had for nearly three years, detained in a high security prison in Saudi Arabia. Her ‘crime’ was to be a women’s rights advocate. Campaigning for a woman’s right to drive a car. Her bravery in these cruelest of environments is nothing more than inspirational. Which is why so many of you sent her a message at the end of 2020 – to give her strength.
She and her family refused to back down. She has led a hunger strike. She has refused to plead guilty. She has remained resolute. She is a heroine. And she is finally at home.
But this won’t be the end of story. She faces huge restrictions on her civil liberties including a five-year travel ban. Less than 48 hours after her release we don’t know how she is going to be treated by the Saudi Government but we do know that she will refuse to be silenced.
There are too many activists still imprisoned in Saudi for demanding their basic human rights. Too many women being held as political prisoners. Too many activists who just want to build a fairer society. Loujain’s release gives everyone hope, just a little. Hope that the future may be different, hope that you really can make a difference.
Loujain – we’re so pleased you are home with your family. Now we need to guarantee your freedom and that of the other women still sitting in cells across Saudi Arabia.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][three_column_post title="You may also want to read" category_id="41669"][/vc_column][/vc_row]
