Ten years in jail and 1,000 lashes: why we must defend Saudi blogger Raif Badawi. By Andrew Brown
It was the fifth
anniversary yesterday of the arrest of the Saudi blogger Raif Badawi, whose supposed crime was to argue for
secularism, democracy and human rights. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison
and 1,000 lashes – a punishment that amounts to death by torture – although
only 50 lashes were inflicted on him in the one session. Medical opinion was
that he would not survive the remainder of that part of his sentence.
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More posts on Rauf Badawi
His cause has been
taken up by humanist organisations, as well as by Amnesty International. He has been honoured with the EU’s Sakharov prize. Even Prince Charles raised his case on a visit to Saudi Arabia. We
may be sure that neither Theresa May nor Donald Trump would do so. It is one
thing to coat huge arms deals in the rhetoric of defending western freedoms,
but quite another to risk any of the profits for the sake of a Saudi man who
wished to enjoy those same freedoms.
The Badawi case is
illuminating about the nature of the Saudi regime and the ideas that it
understands as an existential threat. These include Badawi’s brisk dismissal of
the role of Islam in
public life: “No religion at all has any connection to mankind’s civic progress- the codes governing the administration of the state can hardly be derived
from religion.” Such ideas are obviously incompatible with the practice of
theocracy. And perhaps they are so strange to the Saudi authorities that they
can’t be taken seriously – after all, those convicted of “sorcery” in the
kingdom are beheaded, whereas Badawi may survive his sentence, given enough attention
and support from the outside world.
It is, of course, the
Saudi regime that is chiefly responsible for his suffering, and that has the
power to release him, but the case also suggests how hollow are western
commitments to so-called western values. Badawi believes in democracy,
rationalism and freedom of speech. These are all ideas we are supposed to
promote and applaud, but in places where their exercise is costly we are mostly
silent. I suppose the Saudis
might defend their repressive state by pointing to the horrors that have
engulfed Iraq and Syria to their north and even Yemen to their south. But in all those cases, and especially
in Yemen, the repressive Saudi state has itself been a destabilising factor for
its neighbours: read more:
see also
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