On September 19, 2022, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention issued an official opinion, stating that Saudi Arabia's detention of citizen Abdul Rahman Al-Sadhan - who has been forcibly disappeared since October 2021 - is arbitrary by international human rights law. The Working Group called on the Saudi government to immediately release him and compensate him for his unlawful detention, investigate his detention circumstances, and take appropriate measures against those responsible for these violations. The Working Group requested the Saudi government to bring its laws in line with the obligations it had undertaken under international human rights law.
Information from the source::
Abdul Rahman al-Sadhan is a Saudi citizen, who holds a university degree in business administration, and worked as an assistant to the head of the Saudi Red Crescent in Riyadh before his arrest on March 12, 2018, when members of the Presidency of State Security in civilian clothes arrested him inside his workplace without presenting any warrant. They also confiscated his phone and transferred him to an unknown location, where there was no news of him from his family since the moment of his arrest. The next day, officers from the Presidency of State Security confiscated his computer, car, and other personal belongings. In mid-April 2018, the authorities admitted to detaining him pending investigation, but refused to disclose his place of detention and prevented anyone from visiting or contacting him. From his arrest until September 2022, Al-Sadhan was cut off from his family several times.
Between 2018 and 2019, reports reached Al-Sadhan’s family stating that he was subjected to brutal torture while he was in a secret detention centre where he was subjected to electric shocks, beatings that caused broken bones, flogging, hanging by the feet, sleep deprivation, threats of death and beheading, in addition to insults, verbal and solitary confinement. Furthermore, reports alleged that he was forced to sign confessions while blindfolded.
On March 3, 2021, Al-Sadhan was accused of financing terrorism, providing support and sympathy to the terrorist organization ISIS, using a website and electronic devices to commit crimes prohibited in the counter-terrorism law, and preparing, storing and sending what would prejudice the public order and religious values through tweets, according to the anti-terrorism law and the law. Combating cybercrime. The charges against Al-Sadhan occurred before the anti-terrorism regime came into force, which makes them illegal. Al-Sadhan was denied access to a lawyer in several sessions. Al-Sadhan's father - who is his legal representative - in addition to another lawyer appointed by the authorities, was denied meeting him for sufficient time, obtaining sufficient time to review the evidence, and defending him for sufficient time. On April 5, 2021, the Specialized Criminal Court sentenced Al-Sadhan to 20 years in prison, followed by a further 20-year travel ban, in addition to confiscating his electronic devices and closing the Twitter accounts he was allegedly using. As a result of the inhumane conditions that accompanied Al-Sadhan’s arrest, his health deteriorated, and he suffered from concentration problems and an increase in the level of triglycerides in the blood, and he became close to diabetes as a result of the poor quality of food in prison, solitary confinement, pressure and torture, except that he does not receive care adequate medical.
Al-Sadhan's father appealed the ruling on May 4, 2021, and on October 5, 2021, the Court of Appeal upheld the ruling. Since that date, Al-Sadhan has been forcibly hidden. On November 2, 2021, Al-Sadhan's father appealed the appeal ruling to the Saudi Supreme Court, providing details of the torture his son was subjected to, but the ruling has not yet been issued by the Supreme Court.
Saudi government response::
In February 2022, the Saudi government responded to the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and considered the allegations contained in the communication to be untrue and without evidence, indicating that it had taken steps to investigate the allegations and clarify all that was relevant, without the government providing any evidence to substantiate its claims.
The working group's response::
The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has called on Saudi Arabia to provide evidence substantiating its allegations. The Working Group considered the Saudi authorities’ arrest of Al-Sadhan without an arrest warrant, his enforced disappearance, his pre-trial detention for more than three years without a judicial decision, his deprivation of appropriate legal representation, his torture, his denial of medical care, the lengthy sentence against him, and his punishment for expressing his views peacefully is a violation of international law. The team also considered Al-Sadhan’s detention arbitrary, as it was a direct result of exercising his right to freedom of expression, following his conviction on charges directly related to the authority’s claim that he ran two satirical accounts on Twitter.
The team confirmed that the anti-cybercrime law contains very broad terms that allow the criminalization of peaceful expression and place it within the framework of terrorism. The team also indicated that Article 1 of the Anti-Terrorism Law contains a broad and vague definition of a terrorist crime and that these provisions allow for the criminalization of peaceful expression, in addition to the fact that Al-Sadhan was accused of committing crimes that were not stipulated in the law at the time, in violation of international law.
The Working Group also asked the Saudi government to bring its laws into line with the obligations that Saudi Arabia has made under international human rights law. Finally, the Working Group recommended that the Saudi government accede to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The Working Group also asked the Saudi government to bring its laws into line with the obligations that Saudi Arabia has made under international human rights law. Finally, the Working Group recommended that the Saudi government accede to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights confirms that Abdul Rahman Al-Sadhan's arrest and enforced disappearance are illegal. ESOHR warns of the seriousness of Saudi Arabia's systematic and widespread use of the anti-terrorism and anti-information crime systems - with their loose articles - against opposition activists and human rights defenders. It also indicates that based on these laws, and after torture and unfair trials, Saudi Arabia issues arbitrary prison sentences and travel bans for years, up to death sentences. The organization stresses that the Saudi government's failure to respond to the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention request at the United Nations proves that Saudi Arabia is based on well-established international laws.