Overview of Human Rights in Saudi Arabia

Saudi law does not provide for the protection of many basic rights. The government does not allow citizens the ability to change the national government or political parties, and freedoms of expression, speech, press, movement, association, and assembly are severely restricted. Corruption is rampant throughout all levels of government. There is also a marked lack of transparency and official accountability for human rights violations committed.

The judiciary allows for corporal punishment for many minor crimes. It also is not free of external influence of the monarchy. Fair trials are not common, especially for political prisoners.

Executions take place with regularity, including those carried out for political crimes. The security forces also carry out raids, which lead to the killing or capture of individuals on the country's terror suspect list. Security forces are also responsible for the arbitrary arrest, detainment, beatings and torture of those in custody.

Migrant workers in Saudi Arabia make up almost a third of the nation’s population. Many of these men and women face horrible working conditions including 16-hour work days, unpaid wages, and exposure to physical and sexual abuse.

Other abuses such as government infringement on citizens’ privacy rights in addition to legal and societal discrimination against ethnic and religious minorities are also areas of concern.

Overall, Saudi Arabia has a poor record of human rights.  In fact, human rights issues have historically not held much importance in Saudi Arabia. However, in recent years, there has been a shift. For the first time in history, human rights concerns have become a subject of public discourse and have been allowed to be discussed in the main stream media, albeit with some restrictions. Also in recent years, the Council of Ministers approved the establishment of a Human Rights Commission in Saudi Arabia. The first elections since 1960 occurred for half of the country’s municipal court seats in 2005. While only men could vote, the election was still seen as progress to the international community.

Progress, however, was slowing by 2007.  Indeed, the year  2007 and  well into 2008, the country's judicial system came to the fore.  At issue was the February 2007 storming of the villa of a lawyer, Issam Basrawi, in the town of Jeddah by Saudi secret police.  Baswari was arrested along with nine other reformists in the apparent crackdown on reformist professionals.   The Saudi authorities claimed that the men were financing violent attacks in Iraq and had been critical of the United states military presence in Iraq.   By early 2008, although Baswari was released on the basis of health complications, the other detainees remained in jail without formal charges ever being brought against them.  A lawyer for some of the men said that he was not allowed to speak with his clients. 

Meanwhile, in late 2007, a Saudi blogger, Fouad al-Farhan, was detained for advocating on behalf of the aforementioned reformists who had been jailed.  As well, one activist petitioning  for a constitutional monarchy,  Abdullah al-Hamed, was himself arrested in the same period.  In his case, he was arrested for inciting women to demonstrate against the detention of thousands of terror suspects. 

Indeed, despite a royal decree in October 2007 that the entire judicial system be overhauled, very little has been done to improve the situation.   Human rights activists have said that the Saudi authorities have actually become more repressive as regards political dissent.  The increasing climate of repression has had the unusual effect of linking conservative and reformist Islamists with liberal advocates to condemn the legal and judicial system, and to rail against the devolution of civil and human rights in Saudi Arabia.  

Human Development Index (HDI) Rank:

76th out of 177

Note: Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite index that measures the level of well-being of nations in the world. It uses factors such as poverty, literacy, life-expectancy, education, gross domestic product, and purchasing power parity to assess the average achievements in each nation. It has been used in the United Nation’s Human Development Report since 1993.