U.S. citizen Carly Morris has returned to the United States after a four-year ordeal in Saudi Arabia, but her nine-year-old daughter has had to remain there because, under the kingdom’s male guardianship system, she needs permission from her father, Morris’s ex-husband, to leave the country. Morris is also accused by the Saudi authorities of “insulting the country and Islam”, charges for which she faces trial in absentia in Riyadh Criminal Court on 10 September. 

Carly Morris and her daughter, both U.S. citizens, had been trapped in Saudi Arabia since 2019. They arrived in the country for the first time in August 2019 for what was intended to be a short visit to introduce the girl to her father’s family. However, the father, exercising his rights under the kingdom’s discriminatory male guardianship laws, then refused to allow the girl to go home to the United States with her mother. 

The long-awaited 2022 Personal Status Law that came into force in June 2022 was supposed to have brought about major reform, but instead turned out to codify rather than abolish many elements of the repressive guardianship system, including matters of divorce and child custody. In the event of separation, while the mother is automatically granted custody of any children this is undermined by the fact that the father remains a child’s legal guardian by default, and is able to prevent women from relocating outside of Saudi Arabia with their children.

Morris’s situation became even more desperate when on 15 September 2022 she was summoned by local police in Qassim for questioning by the public prosecutor for “disrupting public order”, a charge commonly brought in Saudi Arabia against people who express any criticism of the authorities. On 18 September she learned that the Saudi authorities had placed her under a travel ban making her, too, unable to leave the country. 

On 7 November Morris was called in by the police in Buraydah, supposedly to clarify details related to her daughter’s identity papers, but instead she was arrested and held for two days. Her travel ban was finally lifted on 22 June 2023 and she was given an exit permit in August. Despite having now left the country, she remains charged with “renouncing Islam”, “slander” and “insulting the country and Islam”. The next hearing in her trial is due to take place in her absence on 10 September at Riyadh Criminal Court. 

ALQST’s Head of Monitoring and Advocacy Lina Alhathloul comments: “Morris’s safe return is welcome news, but overshadowed by the tragedy of her cruel separation from her daughter and ongoing prosecution on spurious charges. There could hardly be a clearer illustration of the Saudi authorities’ misogyny and the ongoing discrimination enshrined in Saudi laws.”

ALQST calls on the Saudi authorities to immediately drop the charges against Carly Morris and to allow her daughter to return safely to the United States.