Date: Monday, December 28, 2009.

Subject: Oppressive Authorities Intensified Brutal Tortures of Judge Suliman Ibrahim Al- Reshoudi, A Former Judge, Attorney and member of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association (ACPRA).

To: The Custodian of the Two Holly Mosques, King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud

Our association has received confirmed information that one of our fellow members, Judge Suliman Al-Reshoudi, has been recentlly subjected to severe physical and psychological tortures in his solitary confinement for the past three years.

This latest torture practice inflicted on Judge Al-Reshoudi is that prison officers tied up his two feet by two separate chains, one of the chains ties up the two feet together and the other ties both feet to his bed frame. During the day, judge Al-Reshoudi is forced into a setting position where he cannot relax or lay down on bed, and during the night the shackles are placed on his feet while sleeping on bed in order to deprive him of a good night sleep. The tight manacles around his aging feet have caused him major discomforts and severe bruises. Prison officers even left him shackled during the time of his family visit, the terrible scene caused his young kids and wife to burst into tears. The supersized toddlers kept asking their ageing dad about the chains and how they could find the keys in order to set him free. His brave wife questioned a prison official about the reasons of these unjustifiable rough treatments, he responded: “we have been authorized from people in the top echelons”, with no further details.

ACPRA has been wondering, why now the oppressive authority has decided to inflict sever tortures on Judge Al-Reshoudi, despite of his incarceration in a solitary confinement for more than three years?

It is extremely impossible to justify this ill treatment as a mean to acquire more false confessions.

This brutal campaign did only happen when Judge Al-Reshoudi had announced his intention in joining ACPRA in his captivity, then prison authorities (i.e., The Department of General Investigations) viewed his decision as a direct challenge to their relentless power. Judge Al-Reshoudi’s three-year solitary imprisonment has increased his determination to remain in peaceful activities and to stay steadfast in civil struggle in the human right field. Moreover, we can understand that this severe torture campaign-that led Al-Reshoudi’s kids to cry near his prison bed-is meant to send a threatening message to other human right activists in order to scare them off from working in this treacherous field.

Judge Al-Reshoudi is widely known in Saudi Arabia as a human-right defender who believes in peaceful activities. He had participated in major political-reform petitions that demand drafting a national constitution, rights for freedom of assembly, and establishing civil-society institutions. If the Interior Ministry could inflict these severe brutalities on activists, then certainly it can get away by torturing ordinary Saudis. Mr. Al-Reshoudi, furthermore, is 73-year old and he suffers from s several age-related illnesses that may explain why he has been held in a hospital room for the past two years. What kind of a message the Interior Ministry is sending to his young followers who admire his ideas of peaceful activities, especially when the Ministry throws their leaders in prison and in top of that tortures them.

This increase in tortures of Judge Al-Reshoudi, as explained earlier by his legal defense team in a legal memorandum addressed to the King on September 12, 2009. Furthermore, these cruel practices vis-à-vis human right advocates amount to severe tortures banned by Islamic jurisprudence and international conventions, such as the anti-torture convention which Saudi Arabia joined and ratified. In addition, degrading treatments are considered one of the most dangerous forms of states’ sponsored terrorisms, and it is impossible for our country to eradicate terrorism if the Interior Ministry enforced it as a practice against activists, let alone political dissidents who are considered persona non grata by the regime. Hence, these oppressive practices are the breeding grounds for violence and terrorism.

Custodian of the Two Holly Mosques,
First, we ask your intervention to put an end to Judge Al-Reshoudi’s Pain and Suffering, as prescribed by all world major religions and international conventions which forbid tortures and incriminate those who practice them.

Second, the Interior Ministry must bear full responsibilities for any possible ramification of these ill-treatments on Judge Al-Reshoudi’s life and health.

Third, Judge Al-Reshoudi, as many activists like him from the current of constitution, civil societies, and human rights, who are falsely accused and thrown in prisons with neither official indictments nor court’s rulings. In addition to judge Al-Reshoudi, these prisoners are: Professor Abdulrahman Al-Shomairi, Ali Khosifan Al-Qarni, Attorney Mousa Al-Qarni, Professor Saud Al-Hashemi, Fahd Alskaree Al-Qurashi, Abdulrahman Bin Sadiq, Saifaldeen Faisal Al-Sherif, and Mansour Salim Al-Otha.

Finally, these degrading practices tarnish state’s reputations, challenge you personal credibility, and destroy our country’s confidence. These torture stories have eclipsed Saudi Arabia’s membership in the United Nations Human Right Council, and make its membership appear as an attempt to cover up these flagrant violations.

Custodian of the Two Holly Mosques,
Your serious remedy would close this shameful file forever, and it would prove your genuine intentions. This would only happen by the immediate release of all political prisoners and bring all those involved in tortures to justice.

Respectfully,

The Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association
(ACPRA