The security police of Jeddah arrested the blogger Fouad al-Farhan

1 January 2008

Some members of al-Mabahith al-'Amma of Jeddah arrested on December 10 Fouad Ahmed al-Farhan, a 32-year-old , a blogger runs the site Alfarhan, at the Jeddah office of the IT company he owns. Security police later confiscated his laptop from his home.

Al-Farhan told his friends prior to his arrest that he had received a phone call by a high-ranking official in the Interior Ministry that he would be detained in the coming two weeks .

The Saudi authorities accused him of writing about the political prisoners in Saudi jails and running an online campaign promoting their issue .

The mentioned high-ranking official promised to detain him for only a short period if he agreed to sign a letter of apology.