Via Human Rights Watch comes unsurprising news that the Saudi regime is preventing reformist critics from traveling:
Saudi authorities had arrested them on March 16, 2004 along with nine others, later released, for signing a petition for reform. Seven of them remain banned from foreign travel, including `Abd al-Rahman al-Lahim, their lawyer. Nine others received travel bans for publicly supporting the reforms. Ibrahim al-Mugaiteeb, president of Human Rights First in Saudi Arabia, found out in January that he is again on the travel ban list. Mubarak bin Zu’air ended up at first detained and then on the list after protesting on Al Jazeera his father’s and his brother’s incarceration for speaking to the media.
Underlying these bans appears to be the government’s desire to punish its critics and to prevent their views from reaching a foreign audience. Matruk Alfalih, a professor of political science at King Sa`ud University in Riyadh, has been unable to take up a sabbatical position at the University of Seattle in the United States.
In imposing the travel bans, the Ministry of Interior has broken Saudi law. Aside from a judicial ruling by a court, the Minister of Interior may impose bans “for defined reasons related to security and for a known period” and must notify those banned within one week of the ban. In its letter, Human Rights Watch describes how some of those banned found out about their bans at airports, land crossings and passport departments months or years after they were imposed. Saudi authorities verbally informed some that the ban would last for five years. In no case did the ministry inform those on the travel ban list of the specific reasons for subjecting them to the ban.
Saudi courts have refused to hear challenges to the travel bans. Al-Lahim attempted to challenge his ban in an administrative court, but the Board of Grievances struck down his suit for lack of jurisdiction over “acts of sovereignty,” though not before noting that he had violated a pledge obtained under duress in prison not to speak publicly about his three reformist clients.
Where even to begin?
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