Saudi student Salma al-Shehab has been sentenced to 34 years in prison following and retweeting dissidents and activists. It is the longest known sentence given to a women’s rights defender in Saudi Arabia. Saudi activists have long been warning Western leaders that giving legitimacy to the crown prince would pave the way for more abuses.
Last week, in Saudi Arabia, Riyadh’s Specialized Criminal Court (SCC) has sentenced 34-year-old Salma al-Shehab to 34 years in jail and imposed a further 34-year travel ban, a sentence considered harsh even by Saudi standards.
The PhD student, who had been enrolled at the University of Leeds in the UK, was detained during a visit in her home country in December 2020.
She has now been found guilty of “assisting those who seek to cause public unrest and destabilize civil and national security by following their Twitter accounts,” according to the court papers.
During her two years abroad, she had shared and liked social media posts that called for the release of the then-detained human rights activist Loujain al-Hathloul, and had supported calls for gender equality in Saudi Arabia.
Is the West kidding itself?
While Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has been spearheading the kingdom’s modernizing program “Vision 2030” — which includes more rights for women, opening the country for tourism and diversifying from oil.
According to Lina al-Hathloul, the head of communications and monitoring of the London-based human rights watchdog Alqst “This appalling sentence makes a mockery of the Saudi authorities’ claims of reform for women and of the legal system.”
Experts point to the fact that the shortfall of gas after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has boosted the kingdom’s self esteem as a global fuel provider to a new level.
Lama Fakih, Director Middle East at Human Rights Watch, says she had high hopes that the US government would apply pressure in the case of al-Shehab. “But the administration’s failure to critique the sentencing to date speaks volumes.”
Lina Aal-Hathloul on the other hand says that Saudi activists have been warning Western leaders that giving legitimacy to the crown prince would pave the way for more abuses.
“He wants to be the great reformer in the eyes of the West, to give the appearance of benevolence and liberty,” says Khaled Abou El Fadl, a distinguished professor of law at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Bethany Al-Haidari, the Saudi case manager at the Freedom Initiative, described the sentence as “abhorrent”.
“Saudi Arabia is boasting to the world that they are improving women’s rights and implementing legal reforms. But there is no question with this sentence that the situation is just getting worse,” she told the BBC’s Newshour programme.
These views are also strongly echoed by Megan K. Stack, a fellow at George Washington University School of Media and Public Affairs. According to Stack, the West is kidding itself about women’s freedom in Saudi Arabia.
In her Op-Ed for New York Times, she writes, “The United States has never really found — and perhaps never sincerely sought — an effective way to coherently, consistently support human rights abroad, particularly in the Middle East. Even before Sept. 11, successive administrations paid lip service to issues like political repression, elections and, perhaps most of all, women’s rights, but these ad hoc moments of pressure were rendered hypocritical against the backdrop of bloodshed and destabilization wrought by U.S. wars and tended to wither away when they clashed with security or economic priorities.”
Sources: DW, New York Times, BBC