Blogger sentenced to 10 years, 1000 lashes, 266,600$ fine

[Irbis]

Saudi blogger receives first 50 lashes of sentence for 'insulting Islam'

Raif Badawi has been given 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes to be carried out over 20 weeks

A Saudi blogger convicted of insulting Islam was brought after Friday prayers to a public square in the port city of Jeddah and flogged 50 times before hundreds of spectators, a witness to the lashing said.

The witness said Raif Badawi’s feet and hands were shackled during the flogging but his face was visible. He remained silent and did not cry out, said the witness, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity fearing government reprisal.

Badawi was sentenced last May to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes. He had criticized Saudi Arabia’s powerful clerics on a liberal blog he founded. The blog has since been shut down. He was also ordered to pay a fine of 1m riyals or about $266,600.

Rights activists say Saudi authorities are using Badawi’s case as a warning to others who think to criticise the kingdom’s powerful religious establishment from which the ruling family partly derives its authority.

London-based Amnesty International said he would receive 50 lashes once a week for 20 weeks. The US, a close ally of Saudi Arabia, has called on authorities to cancel the punishment.

Despite international pleas for his release, Badawi, a father of three, was brought from prison by bus to the public square on Friday and flogged on the back in front of a crowd that had just finished midday prayers at a nearby mosque. His face was visible and, throughout the flogging, he clenched his eyes and remained silent, said the witness.

The witness, who also has close knowledge of the case, said the lashing lasted about 15 minutes.

Badawi has been held since mid-2012 after he founded the Free Saudi Liberals blog. He used it to criticise the kingdom’s influential clerics who follow a strict, conservative interpretation of Islam known as Wahhabism, which originated in Saudi Arabia.

He was originally sentenced in 2013 to seven years in prison and 600 lashes in relation to the charges, but after an appeal the judge stiffened the punishment. Following his arrest, his wife and children left the kingdom for Canada.

Rights groups argue that the case against Badawi is part of a wider crackdown on freedom of speech and dissent in Saudi Arabia since the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings. Criticism of clerics is seen as a red line because of their prestige in the kingdom, as well as their influential role in supporting government policies.

According to Amnesty the charges against Badawi mention his failure to remove articles by other people on his website. He was also accused in court of ridiculing Saudi Arabia’s morality police.

In a statement after the flogging Amnesty called it a “vicious act of cruelty” and said Badawi’s “only ‘crime’ was to exercise his right to freedom of expression by setting up a website for public discussion”.

The US state department spokeswoman Jen Psaki called the punishment an “inhumane” response to someone exercising his right to freedom of expression and religion.

In New York, Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for the UN secretary general, told reporters on Friday that the UN human rights office was “very concerned about the flogging” and had previously raised concerns about harsh sentences in Saudi Arabia for human rights defenders.

So, public torture lasting half a year, severe jail, and loss of all possessions. All for not even being atheist of anything, just the 'good' kind of pro-Western liberal Muslim who advocates equality of religions (some of his blog entries available here for perusal). This is happening concurrently with Charlie spectacle and not a single one of Western leaders with mouth full of freedom of speech praises dared to utter a word about it.

Though, I guess there are some good news too: yesterday, the doctors declared his last week beating was so severe he hadn't had time to heal yet so today's one was mercifully postponed to next week. Truly, where would the world be without such high moral standards?

Oh, and lawyer who dared to defend him? Apparently, this 'crime' is worth 15 years in prison, too.

Why we're attacking ISIS again? We should just cut them a deal, best NATO buds status and free arms in return for (somewhat) out of sight beheadings. Like Saudis do - 10 so far in 2015, more than ISIS, but these are good, state executed ones, so who cares. We offer that to all Gulf states, why not poor misunderstood Islamic State?

[salm]

Why we're attacking ISIS again? We should just cut them a deal, best NATO buds status and free arms in return for (somewhat) out of sight beheadings. Like Saudis do - 10 so far in 2015, more than ISIS, but these are good, state executed ones, so who cares. We offer that to all Gulf states, why not poor misunderstood Islamic State?

I guess as allways resources, influence and stability are more important than human rights. But don´t worry, if ISIS manages to form a stable state and has interesting resources to offer the EU won´t hesitate to trade with them.

[Broomstick]

Don't forget the rule that says you can do whatever the fuck you want inside your own borders, just don't take it outside them.

Saudi Arabia perpetuates things like public torture within its borders but doesn't go to say, France, drag a cartoonist out onto the street and publicly flog him there.* So Saudi Arabia is allowed to continue unmolested in its conduct.

ISIS exports that shit.

It's a lot easier to ignore human rights violations if they stay confined to a geographically small space.




* Yes, I'm aware SA exports Wahhabism, which is a significant component of violent Islamist expansion groups but SA is not directly responsible for the resulting carnage so it gets away with it.

[Irbis]

Don't forget the rule that says you can do whatever the fuck you want inside your own borders, just don't take it outside them.

Saudi Arabia perpetuates things like public torture within its borders but doesn't go to say, France, drag a cartoonist out onto the street and publicly flog him there.* So Saudi Arabia is allowed to continue unmolested in its conduct.

ISIS exports that shit.

It's a lot easier to ignore human rights violations if they stay confined to a geographically small space.

* Yes, I'm aware SA exports Wahhabism, which is a significant component of violent Islamist expansion groups but SA is not directly responsible for the resulting carnage so it gets away with it.

Hmm, how exactly exporting arms, soldiers, money, fanatic preachers, and extremist state propped religion is 'staying within your borders'?

Take a look at Islam extremists everywhere - you will find Saudis. From Morocco to Indonesia. 9/11? Saudis. Afghanistan, Chechenya, Algeria? Saudis. That eeevil ISIS? 3.000 of their most loyal fighters are Saudis. In fact, the ISIS very existence would be in doubt without constant propping from, guess who, Sunni dictators. In what world ready supply of everything needed to fuel 'instant Islamic dictature' kit is being confined to small space?

Or do you mean something where you officially can show state involvement? Why, look no further than 2011 Bahrain invasion where Saudi troops engaged in brutal torture, repression and pacification of local population during Arab Spring. All while US Fifth Fleet looked in silence trying their hardest to not notice anything. Guess Maidans are only good when they don't happen in countries with US bases, eh?

SA wanted to keep Saudi-propped Sunni Arab minority on top, which thanks to Saudi money not only didn't draw any sanctions, but was curiously omitted from Arab Spring news, too. Hell, Arab sheiks used their influence to bribe buy F1 race in 2012 there (after 2011 one was cancelled thanks to fighting around track) to show the world everything is kosher and the troops on the streets are just tourists, honest

[AniThyng]

So, public torture lasting half a year, severe jail, and loss of all possessions. All for not even being atheist of anything, just the 'good' kind of pro-Western liberal Muslim who advocates equality of religions (some of his blog entries available here for perusal). This is happening concurrently with Charlie spectacle and not a single one of Western leaders with mouth full of freedom of speech praises dared to utter a word about it.

I suspect you'd be hard pressed to name any country with a muslim majority where this sort of thing is something you are not at risk of. Certainly not Indonesia (http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-paci ... 15374.html) and not Turkey ( http://www.worldbulletin.net/news/15305 ... ting-islam and http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/20 ... 40386.html ) . Seeing as I've already named the two largest most "moderate" muslim states in existence, both of which have extensive economic and diplomatic ties with the West and exposure to western culture. I think it's safe to conclude most of the others aren't likely to be any better. It's all a matter of degree, of course, since in some of these countries you get away merely by being served a suspended jail sentence. And it's completely different when the punishment is administered by the State after all, as opposed to random misguided terrorists.

I guess as allways resources, influence and stability are more important than human rights. But don´t worry, if ISIS manages to form a stable state and has interesting resources to offer the EU won´t hesitate to trade with them.

It bears repeating that western notions of what "human rights" are and other societies (I don't mean Islam exclusively either, you can say the same about China and India, for example) notions of "human rights" can be directly contradictory so in many cases you literally can't do anything but agree to disagree anyway.

How you deal with that when said societies have members in your society if of course again back to the whole how do we integrate/assimilate/tolerate practices in direct conflict with ours of course.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Don't forget the rule that says you can do whatever the fuck you want inside your own borders, just don't take it outside them.

Saudi Arabia perpetuates things like public torture within its borders but doesn't go to say, France, drag a cartoonist out onto the street and publicly flog him there.* So Saudi Arabia is allowed to continue unmolested in its conduct.

ISIS exports that shit.

It's a lot easier to ignore human rights violations if they stay confined to a geographically small space.




* Yes, I'm aware SA exports Wahhabism, which is a significant component of violent Islamist expansion groups but SA is not directly responsible for the resulting carnage so it gets away with it.

The similarities however are very blurred when the difference between an imam exhorting his people to go commit terrorist acts or join ISIS or Al Qaeda, and an Al Qaeda leader doing the same thing is very small.

[K. A. Pital]

Calling Indonesia a moderate Muslim state is an insult to the Middle Eastern nations, as Indonesia quite recently slaughtered feminists, left-wingers and the rest who were deemed 'suspicious' in the millions using religious youth squads with the full blessing of the imams. At the same time, many Middle Eastern nations that today people call 'extremist havens' had progressive reforms and improved the rights of women.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Calling Indonesia a moderate Muslim state is an insult to the Middle Eastern nations, as Indonesia quite recently slaughtered feminists, left-wingers and the rest who were deemed 'suspicious' in the millions using religious youth squads with the full blessing of the imams. At the same time, many Middle Eastern nations that today people call 'extremist havens' had progressive reforms and improved the rights of women.

Well, relatively speaking, they are. Though granted, post 1997 and the following decade after, things were rather rough in the country, until the last president came to power.