Saudi Arabia has sentenced a 29-year-old women’s rights activist to 11 years in prison due to her advocacy for liberal reforms and her choice of clothing.
Manahel al-Otaibi was arrested in November 2022 for her social media posts supporting women’s rights and calling for an end to the male guardianship system in the country.
She was found guilty of “terrorist offences” in a secret hearing on 9 January this year, under the anti-terror law that criminalizes the use of social media for spreading false information or rumours.
The sentencing was disclosed in late January in response to UN Special Rapporteurs, while her family still does not have access to her court documents or the evidence against her.
Al-Otaibi’s sister, Fawzia al-Otaibi, also faces similar charges but fled Saudi Arabia to avoid arrest after being summoned for questioning in 2022. Amnesty International has criticized the sentence as an “appalling and cruel injustice.”
Since the moment she was arrested, Saudi Arabia’s authorities have subjected her to a relentless catalogue of abuses, from unlawful detention for supporting women’s rights to enforced disappearance for over five months while she was being secretly interrogated, tried and sentenced and subjected to repeated beatings by others in the prison,” said Bissan Fakih, Amnesty International’s campaigner on Saudi Arabia.
“With this sentence the Saudi authorities have exposed the hollowness of their much-touted women’s rights reforms in recent years and demonstrated their chilling commitment to silencing peaceful dissent.”
Criticising the arrest, Lina Alhathloul, member of rights group ALQST, said: “Manahel’s confidence that she could act with freedom could have been a positive advertisement for Mohammed bin Salman’s much-touted narrative of leading women’s rights reforms in the country.
“Instead, by arresting her and now imposing this outrageous sentence on her, the Saudi authorities have once again laid bare the arbitrary and contradictory nature of their so-called reforms, and their continuing determination to control Saudi Arabia’s women.”
Amnesty and ALQTS pointed at the irony in Al- Otaibi’s arrest, saying she had been an early believer in Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s promises of reform.
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