Since the end of last year and in the first months of 2025, a large number of prisoners have been released in Saudi Arabia. Among them are prisoners of conscience, including high-profile human rights activists. This is certainly a step forward since many of these people have been arrested in a completely arbitrary manner and with hardly credible or vague charges. In spite of this, however, a number of critical issues remain, and the repression against human rights activists in Saudi Arabia shows no signs of stopping.

The first prisoners were released in December 2024. They are journalist Malik al-Ahmad, cleric Mohammed al-Khudairi, blogger Dawood al-Ali and other human rights activists. The first two had been arrested during a wave of arrests in 2017 against those who spoke out against government policies. This serious episode has shed light on the repression of the right to speech that is taking place in Saudi Arabia.

Since January, there have been many other releases of people who had been arbitrarily detained. These include, for example, Mohammed al-Qahtani and Essa al-Nukheifi, who had also been arrested for reasons related to their peaceful activism. Their release, however, is conditional as the government has imposed a travel ban that does not allow them to leave the country. Already from this, we can understand how these releases that are taking place in Saudi Arabia are only a façade and how the former detainees still continue to be restricted.

Also very important is the release of a number of prisoners belonging to the Huwaitat tribe. This tribe occupies parts of the land where the much-publicised NEOM project is being developed, which will lead to the construction of a futuristic city known as The Line. In order to take possession of the Huwaitat land, the government has ordered a forced displacement, which the tribe members have peacefully opposed. Despite this, some of them were killed while others were arrested. Their release, therefore, is certainly good news, but it does not detract from the fact that the government is continuing to develop its futuristic project on land that belonged to a tribe that now has nowhere to go.

What remains doubtful with regard to these releases is the manner in which they take place. None of them, in fact, have been formalised through an actual pardon, and it therefore remains in doubt whether the sentences are actually invalidated. If this is not the case, therefore, the former detainees could risk being arrested again, thus leaving them in a state of insecurity.

In addition to this, it is worth noting that despite these releases, there are still many political prisoners in jail in Saudi Arabia. Some of these, moreover, have been detained for many years now. These include Mohammed al-Otaibi, who has been imprisoned for 17 years now. The accusation against him is that he created an unlicensed organisation with the aim of sowing chaos in the country. Another prisoner who has been serving his sentence for a long time (15 years) is Waleed Abu al-Khair. He is the founder of the NGO Monitor of Human Rights in Saudi Arabia and has provided assistance to human rights activists. Waleed was arrested in 2014 and was the first to be tried and sentenced under the Saudi Anti-Terrorism law.

There are many prisoners in the same situation as Mohammed al-Otaibi and Waleed Abu al-Khair. Among them are Abdulaziz al-Shubaily (8 years), Fadhel al-Manasef (14 years), Israa al-Ghomgham (13 years), Abdulrahman al-Sadhan (20 years) and many others. This makes it clear how many people who have been arbitrarily arrested in Saudi Arabia for expressing their opinion or fighting for the protection of human rights continue to suffer terrible persecution. The names mentioned are those of people who have been imprisoned for a long time, but new ones are being added all the time, since every opinion expressed is flagged by the government as something subversive.

Therefore, as much as the releases that have been taking place in Saudi Arabia for the past few months can be seen as something positive, one should not believe that the country is changing course. In Saudi Arabia, freedom of expression is a right that is systematically repressed by the authorities. Anyone who decides to speak out is detained in a completely arbitrary manner and forced to spend years in prison on highly questionable charges. There are many political prisoners who continue to suffer this kind of repression in the country, and many who, from day to day, are at risk for merely expressing their opinion. For this reason, it is necessary to continue to bring the actions of the Saudi government to light so that what is really happening inside the country is not obscured by its “good deeds”.

The post Despite Sporadic Releases, Persecutions Against Political Prisoners Continue in Saudi Arabia appeared first on Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain.

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