Destroying the Freedom of Press in the Kingdom of Silence

THE  COMMITTEE   FOR  THE  DEFENSE  OF  HUMAN  RIGHTS  IN

THE  ARABIAN  PENINSULA

DATE  : 14 / 05/ 2002  

NO  : 115/ H / 2002   

Till now, the Saudi regime could not comprehend the current and positive developments of international ideology, education and political consciousness which our country was a part of them.

The Saudi regime is still blind towards the fact of this international development and the independence of political consciousness, and the growing of developments which begin to grow in the minds of honest educationists and journalists of our country even the common people.

The Saudi regime tries to make our people to follow silently its repress and corrupt polices without granting them their right to criticize even the low officials in its government.

It treats our people with baseness and considers them as unable to participate in political life or to run the country's affairs or to mend the corrupt internal situation of the country on all levels.

This behavior resulted tyranny and control on the free expression, religion and press by the royal family and their associates.

It is worth mentioning that (Ali Makki) the writer of daily al-Watan was denied his right of free expression  when he was stopped of his work for one month because of his legal criticism against the general director of the department of the ministry of Islamic Affairs, Endowments in Jazan , that right guaranteed under Islamic Shari'a and the international law.

What happened to this writer is a part of the framework of restricting the freedom of press which included the poet Abdel Mohsen Mosallam, the writer Omeima Ahmad al-Jalahma, the editor- in- chief of al-Watan (Kinan al-Ghamidi), and the editor of the daily al-Madina (Muhammad al-Fal) , all these actions are among a series of restricting press freedom which supported by the law of journalism which fell far short of the rights of journalists and their Freedom.

It is worth to point that the Saudi regime arrested in Ihsaa a citizen under the charge of distributing leaflets call to boycott the American goods , and held in al-mabhith al-`Amma in Ihsaa.