Mockery Of Justice: Saudi Activist Gets 34 Years In Prison Over Tweets Demanding Women¡¯s Rights

Last week, a woman was quietly given the longest (ever) sentence by Saudi Arabia for being a nonviolent activist and being active on Twitter.

This, according to a rights group, shocked the government's opposition.

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Salma al-Shehab was arrested in January 2021 while on vacation in Saudi Arabia, merely days before the mother-of-two and Saudi citizen was scheduled to fly back to her home in Britain, as per rights groups.

Who is Shehab?

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The mother of two, 33-year-old Shehab is a lecturer at Princess Nourah University in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. She is also a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom.

The oral and dental physician is a member of the Shiite sect of Islam, which many staunch Sunni Muslims deem to be heretical.

Two days before her arrest, on January 13, 2021, Shehab's last tweet on Twitter was a classic Arabic song about missing the company of a loved one.

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According to the European Saudi Organization for Human Rights, or ESOHR, which reviewed the court documents and consulted with her friends, the 33-year-old's charges were all focused on her Twitter activity.

Shehab was active on social media during campaigns trying to call for repealing the country's guardianship system, which gives men legal control over particular aspects of their female relatives' lives.

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She had also advocated for the release of Saudi prisoners of conscience.

Shehab was accused of spreading sedition, assisting those who seek to disturb public order, spreading false and malicious rumors on Twitter, and undermining the security of society and the stability of the state, based on the ESOHR, which keeps records of arrests in the kingdom.

Shehab received her initial sentence of six years in prison in late 2021.

However, after she filed an appeal, it was raised to 34 years, which, per several human rights organizations, is the nation's longest sentence for an utterly peaceful activist.

According to Lina al-Hathloul, head of monitoring and communications at ALQST, a Saudi rights organization with offices in London, the sentence includes a 34-year travel ban and the deactivation of her Twitter account.

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She said, "Now we're working with Twitter not to close it or to make them aware that at least if they're asked to close it, it comes from the Saudi government and not from her."

The ESOHR said in a statement on Tuesday that the decision to sentence Shehab under the anti-terrorism law "confirms that Saudi Arabia deals with those who demand reforms and critics on social networks as terrorists."

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The most recent tweet on her still-active Twitter page is a prayer asking for God's forgiveness if she has ever unintentionally harmed another person and pleading that He help her reject injustice and support those who encounter it.

Her tweet ends with "freedom to the prisoners of conscience and every oppressed person in the world."

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