Saudi Arabia increases dissident preacher’s prison sentence from 23 to 40 years: NGO

Amid a crackdown led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman against scholars, rights activists, pro-democracy campaigners and political opponents, Saudi judicial authorities have extended the prison sentence handed down to a prominent religious preacher.

The Prisoners of Conscience, an independent nongovernmental organization advocating human rights in Saudi Arabia, announced in a post on its official Twitter page that the so-called Court Of Appeal in the capital Riyadh had increased the term of Sheikh Khalid Rashid's imprisonment for the second time, and extended it from 23 to 40 years.

Sheikh Rashid was the imam of a mosque in the Khobar city of Eastern Province for several years. He initially studied criminology in the United States, before he changed his field of activities and studied Sharia law.

The Saudi preacher was reportedly arrested in 2005, when he spoke out against the profane cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) that were originally published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in September that year. The drawings caused global Muslim outrage.

At the time, Sheikh Rashid demanded a sit-in in front of the Governor of Riyadh’s office, and asked for the closure of the Danish embassy. Saudi regime forces detained him after the protest call.

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The Prisoners of Conscience, in a tweet, condemned the arbitrary sentence against Sheikh Rashid and urged his immediate and unconditional release.

“The issuance of harsh sentences against prisoners of conscience is a judicial violation. This is while Saudi Arabia’s judiciary is exercising the practice against defenseless inmates. The charges leveled against all those who have been handed down heavy sentences by the Court of Appeal are trumped-up and extracted under torture,” it wrote.

Human rights organizations argue that the harsh arbitrary sentences given by the Saudi judiciary to imprisoned dissidents manifest the extent of the kingdom’s disregard for international law, rampant injustice, as well as violations of human rights and civil liberties.

Some social media activists have, meanwhile, launched Arabic hashtags on Twitter, and asked Saudi authorities to release Sheikh Rashid unconditionally.

Since bin Salman became Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader in 2017, the kingdom has arrested hundreds of activists, bloggers, intellectuals and others for their political activism, showing almost zero tolerance for dissent even in the face of international condemnation of the crackdown.

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Muslim scholars have been executed and women’s rights campaigners have been put behind bars and tortured as freedom of expression, association, and belief continue to be denied by the kingdom's authorities.

Over the past years, Riyadh has also redefined its anti-terrorism laws to target activism.

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