UK MPs ask Saudi Arabia for access to female detainees

RIYADH (AA) - A group of British lawmakers and international lawyers on Wednesday called on the Saudi authorities to allow them to visit detained female activists amid allegations of torture and abuse.

In an open letter to Saudi Ambassador to London Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz, a parliamentary commission -- established to look into the circumstances of the women’s detention -- asked to visit the female detainees.

“We hope to be able to gather direct testimony from the detainees during our visit in Saudi Arabia,” the head of the U.K. Detention Review Panel, MP Crispin Blunt, wrote in the letter.

“There are credible concerns that the conditions in which the Saudi women activists are being detained may have fallen significantly short of both international and Saudi Arabia’s own standards,” Blunt said in the letter.

“No person should be subjected to the type of treatment that has allegedly been inflicted upon these women activists while in detention,” he said.

He added: “The implications of activists being detained and tortured for exercising their freedom of speech and conducting peaceful campaigns is concerning for all individuals seeking to exercise their human rights in Saudi Arabia.”

According to international rights organizations, in May 2018, Saudi Arabia launched a major crackdown on prominent rights activists.

The authorities accused the activists -- including a number of women -- of “harming the kingdom's supreme interests and providing financial and moral support to hostile elements abroad”.

Last December, Human Rights Watch called on Riyadh to allow independent international monitors to meet with Saudi female activists held in Saudi prisons since May 2018.

In previous statements, the Saudi Information Ministry denied reports that activists detained in Saudi prisons were subjected to assault and torture.