Saudi Arabia has detained thousands of people for years without trial, the Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Sunday, slamming the country’s powerful crown prince for the “arbitrary detentions”.
Official data from the Interior Ministry, analysed by the HRW, showed that authorities had detained 2,305 people for more than six months without referring them to court.
More than 1,870 had been held for more than a year and 251 for more than three years with their cases still “under investigation,” HRW said, citing the Ministry database.
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One person has been held for over a decade in what the HRW said was a case of “documented arbitrary detention”.
The ultraconservative kingdom, an absolute monarchy, has introduced a string of reforms in past months, spearheaded by the country’s unchallenged Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, dubbed “MBS”, who was appointed heir to the throne in June 2017.
Yet, arbitrary detention appears to have “increased dramatically in recent years”, according to the HRW. The group urged the authorities to “stop holding people arbitrarily”.
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“If Saudi authorities can hold a detainee for months on end with no charges, it’s clear that the Saudi criminal justice system remains broken and unjust, and it only seems to be getting worse,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director for the New York-based rights group.
Vision 2030 plan
“It seems that MBS’s Vision 2030 plan better describes the length of detentions without charge than an aspirational time horizon for reforms.”
Prince Salman is the architect of his country’s “Vision 2030” plan, a sweeping reform project aimed at weaning Saudi Arabia of its dependence on oil and modernising one of the most restrictive countries in the world. The kingdom has one of the highest execution rates in the world.