ICC Note:

UN experts have again recently expressed concern how Saudi Arabia, a member of the Human Rights Council at the United Nations, continues to persecute human rights defenders. Defending human rights in Saudi Arabia is a dangerous mission, but not as dangerous as it would be for Saudi Christians to speak out about their treatment. The government simply does not recognize that it is possible to be a non-Muslim citizen of Saudi Arabia, and anyone who openly practices their faith does so at great personal risk. For this reason, the church in Saudi Arabia is deeply underground and isolated, including from the broader human rights conversation internationally. Even so, their human rights are just as much in need of defense as others who suffer other violations in Saudi Arabia.

01/09/2018 Saudi Arabia (IDN) – Despite being elected as member of the Human Rights Council at the end of 2016, Saudi Arabia has “continued its practice of silencing, arbitrarily arresting, detaining and persecuting human rights defenders and critics,” according to a group of top United Nations human rights experts.

“We are also seeking the Government’s clarification about how these measures are compatible with Saudi Arabia’s obligations under international human rights law, as well as with the voluntary pledges and commitments it made when seeking to join the Human Rights Council,” the group of experts said.

Religious figures, writers, journalists, academics and civic activists are being targeted, along with members of the banned Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association (ACPRA), in a “worrying pattern of widespread and systematic arbitrary arrests and detention,” they said.

“We are witnessing the persecution of human rights defenders for peacefully exercising their rights to freedom of expression, assembly, association and belief, as well as in retaliation for their work. The Government has ignored repeated calls by UN experts and others to halt these violations, rectify them, and prevent their recurrence,” the human rights experts said. in a joint statement on January 2.

The experts said more than 60 prominent religious figures, writers, journalists, academics and civic activists are reported to have been detained in a wave of arrests since September 2017, adding to a list of past cases which had already been raised by them with the Government.

“We have written to the Government requesting detailed information about these numerous arrests on terrorism, cyber-crime or any other state security-related charges during that period,” the experts said.

In addition to the new series of arrests since September 2017 and previous cases notified to the Government, the experts also pointed to Saudi Arabia’s failure to implement two recent opinions of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (A/HRC/WGAD/2015/38 and A/HRC/WGAD/2017/63). In both cases, which involved 10 individuals, the Working Group determined that the detentions were arbitrary.

“We call for the release of all the human rights defenders concerned in these cases, and we appeal to the Saudi authorities to ensure their right to reparation and compensation,” the experts said.

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