ALQST is delighted that detained Saudi human rights defender Waleed Abu al-Khair has been chosen to receive the Anna Dahlbäck Foundation Memorial Fund bursary for 2024, for his courageous work for human rights and democratic values in Saudi Arabia. The award, to be presented in Stockholm on 6 September 2024, comes in recognition of Abu al-Khair’s many years of committed activism, and should act as a potent reminder for the international community to do all it can to secure his immediate release from prison.
The Fund was set up to commemorate and continue the non-profit human rights work of Swedish activist and lawyer Anna Dahlbäck, for which it awards an annual bursary. It stated that the decision to give Abu al-Khair this year’s award “aligns with the foundation’s statutory criteria: to make ‘contributions in the spirit of Anna Dahlbäck’ and demonstrate ‘significant commitment and courage’ in standing up for freedom of expression, opinion, and human rights.”
As Abu al-Khair is currently in prison in Saudi Arabia, ALQST’s founder Yahya Assiri will attend in his absence and accept the award on his behalf.
ALQST’s Head of Monitoring and Advocacy Lina Alhathloul commented: “We welcome the foundation’s selecting Waleed for this richly deserved award. As a human rights champion he has tirelessly advocated for democratic reforms and defended countless victims, at great personal cost. It’s also incredibly timely, with Waleed now more than 10 years into a cruel 15-year prison term and being repeatedly ill-treated. We hope it will once again draw attention to his situation and bring about further pressure to secure his release.”
ALQST has long been campaigning for the human rights heroes of Saudi Arabia to be publicly recognised with international awards and prizes for their vital work. We would like to express our appreciation to everyone who has nominated Saudi activists for international awards and call for this to continue, as well as for their struggles to be highlighted through books, films, documentaries, the naming of streets and parks after them, and every other means possible.
Background
Waleed Abu al-Khair, born 17 June 1979, is a prominent human rights defender and founder of the NGO Monitor of Human Rights in Saudi Arabia (MHRSA). He has spent much of his life advocating for democratic reforms in the country and, before his arrest, provided legal representation for many victims of human rights abuses.
Abu al-Khair was arrested on 15 April 2014 after refusing to sign a pledge to give up his human rights activism, and became one of the first activists to be tried and sentenced under Saudi Arabia’s draconian Counter-Terrorism Law. He was tried in the Specialised Criminal Court, an exceptional jurisdiction that was set up in 2008 to try cases of terrorism but has since been used to prosecute numerous peaceful human rights defenders.
On 6 July 2014, Abu al-Khair was sentenced to 15 years in prison, to be followed by a 15-year travel ban and a fine of 200,000 Saudi Arabian riyals (more than £35,000) as punishment for his lawful and peaceful human rights advocacy. The charges against him included “inciting public opinion against the State and its people”; “inciting international organisations against Saudi Arabia with the intention of ruining its reputation”; and “setting up and supervising an unlicensed association”, namely the MHRSA, which he registered in Ontario, Canada after it was denied a licence in the kingdom.
In 2015 and 2018, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) released formal opinions in which it found his arrest, prosecution, conviction and sentencing to be arbitrary and in contravention of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. On both occasions the WGAD called on the Saudi authorities to immediately release Abu al-Khair, provide reparations, and investigate his unlawful arrest, detention and conviction.
Throughout his time in detention, Abu al-Khair has suffered ill-treatment by prison authorities including solitary confinement, sleep deprivation, restricted visits, and denial of food, medications and adequate medical care, which has prompted him to carry out several hunger strikes in protest.
The Anna Dahlbäck Memorial Fund award is the latest example of the support and recognition Abu al-Khair has received for his work from across the world. He and fellow Saudi human rights defenders Abdullah al-Hamid and Mohammad Fahad al-Qahtani jointly received the 2018 Right Livelihood Award for their “visionary and courageous efforts, guided by universal human rights principles, to reform the totalitarian political system in Saudi Arabia”. Abu al-Khair has won several other prestigious international awards for his work, including the Law Society of Upper Canada’s Human Rights Award, the Olof Palme Prize, the Ludovic Trarieux International Human Rights Award, the PEN Pinter Writer of Courage Award, and the American Bar Association’s International Human Rights Award.
