Amnesty International starts new campaign demanding release of Saudi activists

Amnesty International starts new campaign demanding release of Saudi activists

Amnesty International has launched a human rights campaign urging the Saudi kingdom to to immediately and unconditionally release all prisoners detained for peaceful protest.

“A sufficient number of Saudis have taken the initiative to show their support for the Saudi activists who are being prosecuted by the state,” the organisation said.

It added in its human rights campaign: “King Salman will have to listen to them by releasing the activists from Saudi prisons.”

The human rights campaign follows a report by Amnesty International, in which it confirmed that Saudi Arabia has recently intensified its crackdown on human rights activists and opponents, and has increased the pace of executions over the past six months.

It noted that the Saudi authorities executed at least 40 people between January and July 2021 alone.

In a report entitled “The Saudi crackdown on freedom of expression after the G20 meeting”, Amnesty International said that “the Kingdom, after handing over the presidency of the G-20, ratified sentences against at least 13 people.”

The European-Saudi Organisation for Human Rights has monitored the execution of 31 death sentences in the first half of 202, and confirmed that it has already exceeded the total number of executions carried out during the entire year 2020.