In a chilling development, the Saudi Arabian authorities and government-aligned media launched a public smear campaign last night to try to discredit six prominent detained women’s rights defenders as “traitors” following their arrest this week, Amnesty International said today.
After midnight local time, official statements in state media accused six activists and one other individual of forming a “cell”, posing a threat to state security for their “contact with foreign entities with the aim of undermining the country’s stability and social fabric”. A related hashtag describing them as “Agents of Embassies”, along with a graphic showing the six activists’ faces, have also been circulating on social media.
It is believed that the official statement refers directly to six prominent human rights defenders arrested early this week , whose names had not been publicly announced. Among them is Loujain al-Hathloul, the well-known campaigner against the ban on women drivers in Saudi Arabia.
After midnight local time, official statements in state media accused six activists and one other individual of forming a “cell”, posing a threat to state security for their “contact with foreign entities with the aim of undermining the country’s stability and social fabric”. A related hashtag describing them as “Agents of Embassies”, along with a graphic showing the six activists’ faces, have also been circulating on social media.
It is believed that the official statement refers directly to six prominent human rights defenders arrested early this week , whose names had not been publicly announced. Among them is Loujain al-Hathloul, the well-known campaigner against the ban on women drivers in Saudi Arabia.
“This chilling smear campaign is an extremely worrying development for women human rights defenders and activists in Saudi Arabia. Such blatant intimidation tactics are entirely unjustifiable,” said Samah Hadid, Amnesty International’s Middle East Director of Campaigns. Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman has presented himself as a ‘reformer’, but such promises fall flat amid the intensifying crackdown on dissenting voices in the kingdom. His pledges amount to very little if those who fought for the right to drive are now all behind bars for peacefully campaigning for freedom of movement and equality.
“We are calling for the immediate and unconditional release of all activists still being detained solely for their human rights work.”
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