Responding to a Saudi Arabian courtâs sentencing of five people to death and three others to prison for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, Lynn Maalouf, Amnesty Internationalâs Middle East Research Director, said:
âThis verdict is a whitewash which brings neither justice nor the truth for Jamal Khashoggi and his loved ones. The trial has been closed to the public and to independent monitors, with no information available as to how the investigation was carried out.
âThe verdict fails to address the Saudi authoritiesâ involvement in this devastating crime or clarify the location of Jamal Khashoggiâs remains.
âSaudi Arabiaâs courts routinely deny defendants access to lawyers and condemn people to death following grossly unfair trials. Given the lack of transparency from the Saudi authorities, and in the absence of an independent judiciary, only an international, independent and impartial investigation can serve justice for Jamal Khashoggi.â
Background
The Public Prosecutionâs findings into the murder of Jamal Khashoggi on 2 October 2018 were published by the Saudi Press Agency today. The trial involved 31 individuals, 11 of whom were charged and eight were convicted today. Five were sentenced to death and three were sentenced to prison terms. They were tried and sentenced before the Criminal Court in Riyadh. The verdict is subject to an appeal.
A UN report released by the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Agnes Callamard, in June 2019 concluded that Jamal Khashoggi was the victim of âan extrajudicial killing for which the state of Saudi Arabia is responsible under human rights lawâ. Saudi Arabia failed to cooperate with Special Rapporteur Callamard during her investigation.
Agnès Callamard, a UN special rapporteur who authored an inquiry into Khashoggiâs death, said in a tweet on Monday that the trialâs conclusion was a âmockeryâ and the âantithesisâ of justice. She has previously said the search for justice must not be left to the Saudi judicial system, which she said was âso vulnerable to political interferenceâ.
Netflix defended its decision, stressing that it was in response to a âvalid legal requestâ from the kingdomâs communications and information technology commission, to which it acceded in order to âcomply with local lawâ.
âWe strongly support artistic freedom worldwide and only removed this episode in Saudi Arabia after we had received a valid legal request â and to comply with local law,â the company told the Financial Times.
It added that the Saudi telecoms regulator cited a cyber-crime law that states that âproduction, preparation, transmission, or storage of material impinging on public order, religious values, public morals, and privacy, through the information network or computersâ is a crime punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine not exceeding SR3m ($800,000).
The American magazine Foreign Policy reported that since the beginning of the mid-term elections in the United States, conservative media outlets have fiercely targeted Somali-American congresswoman Ilhan Omar, who wears hijab, in response to Democratsâ efforts to lift the ban on religious headwear in the House of Representatives in order to integrate congresswoman Omar.
The magazine added that the attack against the presence of Muslim congresswomen was not only led by the US media, but also included the Saudi media which launched a scathing campaign targeting female Muslim deputies. Saudi academics and intellectuals recently accused Omar and Palestinian-American Rashida Tlaib of belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Foreign Policy quoted an article published on Sunday by the Saudi-owned news website Al-Arabiya, saying that both women were part of an alliance between the Democratic Party and Islamic groups to control the Congress. The article stressed the womenâs opposing stance towards President Donald Trumpâs sanctions on Iran and his position on isolating Islamic movements. (...)
"Saudi Arabia has not ordered $110 billion worth of military goods and services. Saudi Arabia has not ordered $450 billion worth of goods and services across the board. Over one million jobs are not at stake. ...Trump said that all told, Saudi Arabia has $450 billion in orders from the United States. We asked the White House and the U.S. - Saudi Arabian Business Council for any data on this. We did not hear back. ...Trump said that Saudi Arabia has ordered $450 billion from U.S. companies, including $110 billion in military contracts, representing over a million jobs. Orders on that scale donât exist. There is no data behind the $450 billion, and the $110 billion is a blend of smaller deals in progress, old offers that have not come through, and speculative discussions that have yet to move forward. Trumpâs claims about jobs ignores the long runway between signed agreements and actual delivery and payment. He treats spending that could play out over a decade as if it were spent in one year. More importantly, if the $450 billion in orders is a mirage, the 1 million jobs is equally without substance."
Nice trick R_P. Thanks. The browser (Opera) reports the site as insecure but at least I can load it. Not a big fan of Thomas Friedman......
To add to the topic, American journalists, western journalists in general, have this annoying habit of projecting their own wishful thinking on social movements marked by large street demonstrations. The most egregious example in recent years was the coverage of the Arab Spring.
The Arab Spring was for the most part a reactionary movement against cuts to food and fuel subsidies that should have never seen the light of day in the first place. The protests were not peaceful but violent.
So many people want to finger point the big and the powerful and feel very uncomfortable 'blaming' ordinary folks for bad policy outcomes.
