A Riyadh court on Monday sentenced Loujain Alhathloul, a Saudi women’s rights activist, to nearly six years in prison under a terrorism law, state-linked Saudi media reported.
Alhathloul, 31, was charged with “serving a foreign agenda inside the Kingdom” and further “accused of supporting this agenda through online activity.”
The activist faced other charges including “cooperation with several individuals and entities that have been accused of criminal acts” in violation of Saudi Arabia’s anti-terrorism law.
“The presiding judge said the detainee was found guilty of the charges in line with article 43 of the anti-terrorism law,” the pro-Saudi government newspaper Asharq al-Awsat reported after attending Alhathloul’s public court hearing.
Although Alhathloul was sentenced to five years and eight months in prison, “the court suspended two years and 10 months of her sentence, and backdated the start of her jail term to May 2018, meaning she only has three months left to serve,” the Guardian noted.
Alhathloul may appeal the sentence within 30 days.
“She was charged, tried and convicted using counter-terrorism laws,” the activist’s sister, Lina Alhathloul, said in a statement.
“My sister is not a terrorist, she is an activist. To be sentenced for her activism for the very reforms that MBS [Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman] and the Saudi kingdom so proudly tout is the ultimate hypocrisy,” she said.
Saudi authorities arrested Alhathloul, a Saudi national, in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in March 2018 while she was studying there. They placed her on a plane to Riyadh, where she was detained under house arrest before being moved to a prison in May 2018, human rights groups say. Alhathloul was among a dozen other Saudi women’s rights activists arrested at the time in what observers viewed as a crackdown on dissent by Saudi Arabia’s government.
Alhathloul advocated for women’s right to drive in Saudi Arabia before it was granted in 2018 and for the removal of male chaperone laws that restrict women’s freedom of movement in the kingdom and their right to travel abroad.
The activist has told her family that she has allegedly suffered torture, including sexual assault, electrocution, and flogging while detained over the past two and a half years. A Saudi court recently dismissed Alhathloul’s allegations, citing a lack of evidence.
“Alhathloul’s family said in a statement she will be barred from leaving the kingdom for five years and required to serve three years of probation after her release,” the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) reported Monday. The activist’s family is largely based in Canada.