DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) A Saudi Arabian court sentenced a prominent lawyer to three months in prison on Tuesday, a rights group said, while the same day a Saudi writer was released from jail after being investigated for blasphemy.
The two detentions point to what rights groups say
is a pattern of violations against activists and writers for peacefully exercising freedom of speech. Political dissent and criticism of the state is not generally tolerated and independent local human rights groups are not given licenses to operate.
Amnesty International said last week in a report titled "Saudi Arabia: Unfulfilled Promises" that torture and ill-treatment is frequently used to extract "confessions" from detainees and legal proceedings fall short of ensuring fair trials, with people charged under vaguely-related offenses such as "disobeying the ruler."
The most recent verdict in the kingdom sentenced lawyer Waleed Abu al-Khair to three months in prison for signing a statement calling for reforms in the kingdom, according to the London-based Institute for Human Rights in Saudi Arabia.
The statement signed by him and around 50 others condemned long prison sentences given in 2011 to men who were detained in 2007. The statement also called for the right to peaceful assembly and for an end to police shootings of Shiite Muslim protesters in eastern Saudi Arabia. It was signed in 2011 during the height of the Arab Spring uprisings that toppled autocratic governments across the region.
