Saturday, 17 May 2025
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** Ten years in Saudi prison for a tweet
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“Saudi Arabia criticised for ignoring the USA’s appalling human rights record” – that was the headline ([link removed]) on satirical website News Thump, spoofing this week’s arms deal between the two countries. In these bleak times, I’ll take laughter where I can get it. But behind the joke is a darker truth: the USA’s steady backslide on human rights and Saudi Arabia’s ongoing abuses. This week, it’s Saudi Arabia that demands our attention.

Make no mistake – the petrostate is having a great week (at the top, that is). As is often the case, the good news for the elite rests on suffering at the bottom – and stories the government would rather you didn’t hear. On Wednesday, both Human Rights Watch and FairSquare sounded the alarm over a “surge” in migrant construction worker deaths, as Saudi Arabia ramps up preparations to host the 2034 World Cup. The reports ([link removed]) are grim. There have already been fatalities, but pinning down exact numbers is nearly impossible: independent media are muzzled and labour unions banned.

We’ve been here before, with Qatar in 2022. This time we can only hope that speaking up early actually prompts change. We won’t hold our breath though. As our own investigation Oiling the Wheels of Injustice ([link removed]) made clear, Saudi Arabia has very successfully thrown money at its image while its human rights record has tumbled.

But perhaps the most pressing story for Index this week is that of British father of four, Ahmed al-Doush ([link removed]) . He’s just been sentenced to 10 years in a Riyadh court, allegedly for a tweet ([link removed]) he posted seven years ago related to Sudan, which provided military support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen, and for his association with a Saudi critic in exile. He reportedly later deleted the tweet.

He was arrested last August when on holiday with his family. Saudi Arabia has form here: in 2021 Leeds University student Salma al-Shehab ([link removed]) was detained during a visit to Saudi Arabia because of social media activity. She was handed a 34-year sentence in 2022 before being released earlier this year, following pressure from several advocacy groups, including Index ([link removed]) .

We’ve now written to UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, urging him to intervene ([link removed]) in al-Doush’s case. Al-Doush has already missed the birth of his fourth child. His wife, Nour, says he’s in poor health due to a thyroid condition, raising serious concerns about his access to medical care.

“The night times are the hardest for me when I’m alone and it’s quiet,” Nour ([link removed]) told the Sunday Times ahead of her husband’s trial. Our message to her: Index is here to counter the quiet, and we will try as hard as we can to help get your husband released.

Jemimah Steinfeld

CEO, Index on Censorship


** More from Index
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Donna Ockenden: “There has got to be an absolute commitment to listening to women” ([link removed])

The senior midwife speaks to Index about the culture of silence surrounding maternity care ([link removed])

Annabel Sowemimo on the silent killer in the NHS ([link removed])

The doctor discusses the difficulties of speaking out against institutional racism in UK healthcare ([link removed])

From Gaza to Mali: The week in free expression ([link removed])

A round-up of the key stories covering censorship and free expression from the past seven days ([link removed])

A letter to David Lammy on the imprisonment of Ahmed al-Doush ([link removed])

Index CEO writes to foreign secretary calling for action over jailed British national ([link removed])

The female keyboard warriors taking on Myanmar’s military junta ([link removed])

Digital activists are using the power of the internet to expose human rights abuses ([link removed])

Margaret Atwood wins The British Book Award for Freedom to Publish ([link removed])

The Handmaid's Tale author was awarded the prize in partnership with Index on Censorship ([link removed])

Kashmir’s residents are living under the watchful eye of surveillance ([link removed])

Communities have faced increased scrutiny since the region’s special status was revoked ([link removed])

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** We’re Still Alive: Resistance, Solidarity and Hip-Hop in Iran
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Join Index on Censorship and Some Great Reward, Glasgow for a Listening Party celebrating the music and resistance of Iranian rapper, Toomaj Salehi.

Thursday, 29 May at 6pm

MORE INFORMATION ([link removed])


** From Gaza to Mali: The week in free expression ([link removed])
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** >> GAZA: ([link removed]) [link removed] stars urge BBC to release delayed medics documentary ([link removed])
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** >> NEW ZEALAND: ([link removed]) [link removed] Maori MPs due to be suspended for performing haka
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** >> AZERBAIJAN: ([link removed]) [link removed] independent journalists arrested ([link removed])
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** >> AFGHANISTAN: ([link removed]) [link removed] crackdown on “immoral” content on social media ([link removed])
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** >> EUROPE: ([link removed]) [link removed] JD Vance right on the continent’s free speech problem?
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** >> USA: ([link removed]) [link removed] Salman Rushdie’s attacker gets 25-year sentence ([link removed])
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** >> MALI: ([link removed]) [link removed] leader Assimi Goïta dissolves all political parties ([link removed])
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** Flashback
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Exposing Saudi’s nasty tactics ([link removed])

by Adam Crafton ([link removed])

Index on Censorship, volume 51, issue 3 ([link removed])

When Adam Crafton investigated Saudi Arabia’s abuse of LGBTQ+ people following the state’s sovereign wealth fund takeover of Newcastle United FC, he too became the subject of abuse. He wrote about his experience for Index. Read the story here. ([link removed])


** Support our work
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The world is becoming more authoritarian and our work calling for the release of political prisoners in Saudi Arabia, uncovering silenced voices in the UK and promoting freedom of expression in countries such as Myanmar, India and Pakistan has never been more important.

By supporting Index on Censorship today, you can help us in our work with censored artists, jailed musicians, journalists under threat and dissidents facing torture or worse.

Please donate today ([link removed])

Photos by: (Mohammed bin Salman) MEAphotogallery/CC BY-NC-ND 2.0; (fan at Newcastle FC dressed in Saudi attire) Associated Press / Alamy Stock Photo

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