Chapter Four

The Judiciary

In principle independence of the judiciary is recognized by the new laws. Judicial independence was one of the ten points in the 1962 reform program adopted by the government. It was also one of the demands articulated in two important petitions submitted to the king by the country's elite in 1990 and 1991.1 Saudis interviewed by Middle East Watch complain about what they see as arbitrariness of the judicial system. This is attributable in part to the scarcity of written laws, leading to inconsistencies in judicial decisions.

Although judges are nominally independent, there are reports from within the judiciary that occasionally judges come under pressure from senior members of the royal family and other government officials to influence their decisions. According to a recent State Department report, such pressure has sometimes swayed judges, "Jurists are...aware and reportedly have on occasion acceded to the power and influence of the royal family and their associates."2 Most Saudis interviewed by Middle East Watch agreed with this assessment.3 They believed that members of the royal family receive preferential treatment in all phases of the judicial process: from the police who avoid arresting them; from prosecution authorities who either refrain from filing charges against princes or, alternatively, refer them to special tribunals before which it may be easier to get preferential treatment; and from the courts themselves who sometimes defer to the king or senior members of the family in such matters.

Because laws are largely unwritten and may therefore be ambiguous, common plaintiffs without lawyers are at a disadvantage in court cases against members of the royal family. This is most obvious in land disputes. Many farmers and tribes do not have title to their ancestral lands, whose boundaries expand or diminish according to climatic cycles. Under a re-interpretation of the Shari`a principle of communal property, the king has been given wide-ranging authority in granting pieces of land without clear title. Over the years, the king, and in some cases other senior members of the royal family, have granted large areas of land to princes and their associates, leading to disputes with farmers and tribes who claimed these lands as their ancestral domains. In this gray area of the law, courts are hamstrung because the ruler (waliyy al-amr, i.e. the king) is given wide discretionary power. Because of the perceived pressure from the royal family, judges feel under pressure not to attempt to check abuse of this power, leading many Saudi citizens to believe that commoners and the royal family members are not really equal before the judicial system.4

Judicial authority is compromised in other ways. Under Saudi regulations and practice, the prosecution is not obliged to present cases to the regularly constituted courts. The government regularly sets up ad hoc tribunals to adjudicate political cases or any other case where it is felt that regular courts may make decisions that the government does not consider acceptable. The detention and the prosecution of suspects are handled almost entirely by the Ministry of Interior, which is in charge of the police and the intelligence services. There is no judicial review of the duration of detention, or procedures of arrest and search. The courts can, and do, throw out confessions extracted under torture, but this happens only in cases referred to them by the government who rarely refers political cases to regularly constituted courts.

Despite these shortcomings, the Basic Law of Government states only a few general principles and is short on specific guarantees for judicial independence. According to Article 46, "the judiciary is an independent authority." Under Article 47, "the right to file legal suits is guaranteed to all citizens and residents according to procedures specified by law." This latter provision is fatally flawed, however, by the absence of a written law of judicial procedures. A judicial procedures act - the first of its kind in Saudi Arabia - was passed by the Council of Ministers and ratified by King Fahd in June 1990. This welcome law established guidelines for protective custody and pretrial detention and also clarified the sometimes problematic jurisdictional division between the Shari`a and secular courts. Two months later, King Fahd repealed the law, asserting that there was a "need of further study," once again leaving detainees with virtually no protection against arbitrary arrest and detention, especially at the hands of the secret and religious police.

Article 48 of the Basic Law states that, "courts shall apply the provisions of Shari`a according to the Holy Book and the Tradition and to the laws issued by the King that do not conflict with the Holy Book and the Tradition." The Tradition, called Sunna or Hadith in Arabic, refers to the sayings of Prophet Muhammad and accounts of his deeds during his prophecy years (610-632 A.D.). Although the two Arabic words are used in the singular, they in fact refer to numerous collections approved by various schools of Sunni and Shi`a Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) as authoritative sources of law. Not all collections are approved by all schools. In Saudi Arabia, several collections are approved. For interpretation of these texts, judges use a number of approved commentaries. Since most of these commentaries were written several hundred years ago, they are not always directly applicable to cases before judges. Each judge has therefore had to extrapolate or to apply his own interpretation to the holy texts, leading to inconsistencies and lack of uniformity in judgement and in sentencing.

Article 49 states that, "Article 53 notwithstanding, courts adjudicate all conflicts and crimes."5 However, there is no requirement in the law that a defendant be brought to trial to begin with. Since there is no legal limit to pre-trial detention, a suspect may therefore be held indefinitely and never brought to trial. Alternatively, a defendant could be brought to a hearing before a secret panel to decide his fate. Both practices have been common in Saudi Arabia in a range of security cases, political offenses and commercial disputes. Frequently, the government bypasses the court system altogether, disposing of suspects either by administrative action or by forming closed-door summary tribunals to try them. In 1980, for example, then-King Khaled ordered the execution, without any judicial proceeding, of sixty-three suspects captured bygovernment troops after bloody clashes with a radical Islamic group in which more than two hundred government forces were killed. While executions without trial are exceptional, lesser administrative sentences are common, including lengthy prison terms and flogging.

Article 53, quoted above, refers to the Board of Grievances, the administrative court where government decisions may be contested. Despite its appearances, this Board, in existence since 1955, is merely a government body that defers to the wishes of the Council of Ministers and to the king. Moreover, by its charter the board is barred from hearing cases against decisions of "sovereignty," thus excluding two major classes of cases related to security and constitutional matters.

Missing in the new laws is any provision for the establishment of a constitutional court to arbitrate conflicts that may arise among the King, the Council of Ministers and the Consultative Council or between private citizens and the government over the interpretation of constitutional matters. The new laws retain the authority of the king as the only judge for such matters.

Chapter Five

Civil and Political Rights in the New Legislation

In one general statement the Basic Law offers: "The state shall protect human rights according to Shari`a," (Art. 26). This is the first time in Saudi history that the government has formally recognized the concept of citizens' rights vis-a-vis the state, and acknowledged the concept of human rights per se.1 However, protection provided by the new laws of civil and political rights is scant and, when stated, very much qualified. The reference in Article 26 to the Shari`a is problematic because the Shari`a as applied in Saudi Arabia is not codified in written laws; the final nominal authority for its interpretation is the government-appointed Council of Senior Scholars. This council, however, has traditionally deferred to the King's interpretation of the Shari`a in political matters, including the treatment of most human rights. In this way, the Saudi law gives the government near complete discretion to define the concept and scope of human rights.

This passing and qualified reference to the need to protect civil and political rights is all the more alarming because Saudi Arabia has declined to sign most international human rights agreements. Saudi Arabia is a party to only three international human rights instruments: the Genocide Convention, the Slavery Convention and the Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery. Indeed, the kingdom was one of only a handful of countries - South Africa and former Soviet Bloc countries were the others - that did not vote for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights when it was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 10, 1948. Saudi Arabia's stated reservations to the Universal Declaration were that its call for freedom of religion violated the precepts of Islam, and that the human rights guaranteed by the Islamic-based law of Saudi Arabia surpassed those secured by the Universal Declaration.2 These two arguments were later repeated to explain Saudi refusal to sign most other human rights documents, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.3 The only other pertinent international treaties that Saudi Arabia has adhered to are the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and thirteen (of more than 170) conventions of the International Labor Organization.

Protection Against Arbitrary Arrest and Detention

Article 27 of the Basic Law states that, "It is prohibited to restrict the actions of any one, detain or imprison him except according to law." The problem with this admirable principle is that the law referred to here is very permissive and does not provide for habeas corpus. Saudi arrest and detention procedures are governed by Imprisonment and Detention Law No. 31 of 1978, and its 1982 Bylaws issued by the Minister of Interior. The Law places very few restrictions on the grounds or duration of pretrial detention of suspects. Detainees may be held indefinitely without trial. Nor is there a requirement that a family be notified of the arrest. Although in recent years a family is often able to find out if one of its members is detained, formal notification is rare. It is equally rare for a detainee, or his family, to be informed of the charges against the suspect. Under the law, detainees may be interrogated without the benefit of legal counsel. Legal counsel is allowed at the discretion of the Ministry of Interior if a defendant asks for it and can pay for it.

In the case of security prisoners, a category that in Saudi Arabia includes non-violent political opponents, Article 4 waives all restrictions for "crimes involving national security." It gives the Minister of Interior - already granted broad discretion to arrest and detain - virtually unlimited authority over state security suspects, with no judicial review of any kind and without the benefit of legal counsel. Nor, in practice, does this law apply to detention by the religious police.

During the Gulf crisis, the Saudi government rounded up scores of opponents of the war, most of whom were members of various religious groups. Nearly all were released after the war and were never charged with any crime. In accordance with standard Saudi practice, most of these detainees were held in prolonged incommunicado detention without access to family or legal counsel. An exceptional few were allowed legal counsel after the initial interrogation and, in the case of foreign detainees, visits by embassy representatives.

Hundreds of foreign residents, mostly Arab nationals, were arrested after an armed attack on a bus carrying U.S. military personnel in Jiddah on February 3, 1991. Most were released weeks later after the authorities were satisfied that the main suspects had been apprehended. While in custody, nearly all were beaten and held incommunicado.

A royal pardon issued in June 1991, on the occasion of Eid al-Adha, the Muslim feast of sacrifice, resulted in the freeing of most prisoners held for politically motivated offenses without due process. Significant though it was, this was the only notable improvement in human rights in Saudi Arabia in recent years. Granting amnesty is customary around Muslim holidays. But, in 1991, releases on the occasion of the feast included more prisoners than in previous years, perhaps in celebration of the Desert Storm victory and as an attempt to mend fences with the opposition. The religious opposition was vocal in its displeasure at the presence of foreign troops in the country and the secular opposition wanted to use the crisis to pressure the government to introduce some liberal reforms. Throughout the crisis, the government jailed supporters of both groups and muzzled some of their leaders. After the war, the king's amnesty may have aimed at patching things up between the government and the opposition.

Those pardoned included prisoners suspected of membership in the secular Arab Socialist Action Party and two Shi`a organizations: Hizb Allah of Hijaz (Party of God in al-Hijaz) andthe Organization of Islamic Revolution. However, the amnesty did not mean immediate rehabilitation of the former prisoners. Security prisoners were given a five-year probationary period during which they cannot travel abroad or hold government jobs.

A number of long-term security prisoners did not benefit from the 1991 amnesty. They include twenty people arrested in 1988 on suspicion of bombing oil installations in the eastern oil town of al-Jubail. Others in detention without trial who did not benefit from the June 1991 royal pardon include five Shi`a students accused of setting a fire in their dormitory at King Saud University in Riyadh in July 1989.

The royal pardon did not put an end to the arbitrary detention of peaceful political opponents. During December 1991 and January 1992, scores of Islamic fundamentalist opponents were rounded up by the secret police. They were apprehended, and have been held incommunicado, without due process of law, on suspicion of speaking out, circulating petitions and distributing cassettes critical of government policies. None has yet been formally charged or tried.4

Another amnesty, in March 1992, during the holy month of Ramadhan, was mainly for suspects in common crimes. The king ordered the release of 2,956 prisoners, including 1,259 foreigners, but only three Shi`a citizens who may have been imprisoned for opposition activities were included.5 The pardon did not include fundamentalists recently rounded up for speaking out against government policies, or any of the other long-term political prisoners. The royal pardon was not based on judicial review and included many who had been held without trial for long periods without ever appearing before a court of law. The pardon, the second in less than a year, underscored the large personal discretion of the king in judicial matters.

Apart from security-related offenses, Saudi Arabia continues to hold scores of Saudi and foreign prisoners in defiance of international law, some of them for over a decade. Most have not been tried for criminal offenses, and some have never been tried at all. Most are imprisoned in "debtors' jails" solely because of bankruptcy or failure to fulfill other contractual obligations, in clear violation of principles set forth in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.6

In August 1991, Neville Norton, a British businessman, was released after five years in detention without trial because of a business dispute with members of the royal family. In the ten years preceding his detention, Norton's passport was confiscated, effectively preventing him from leaving the country. This was the latest in a string of similar cases involving foreign businessmen who had fallen afoul of their Saudi partners or members of the royal family. Some subsequently reported that they had been tortured during detention. Most foreign governments, including the United States, refrain from intervening or publicizing the issue for fear of jeopardizing ties with Saudi Arabia.

Torture and Cruel and Inhuman Punishment

There is no prohibition in the new laws against torture or against cruel and inhuman punishment, or the mistreatment of prisoners, despite the fact that the use of force to elicit confessions is common in the Saudi security system. Harsh conditions of detention aimed at punishing prisoners are also instituted. While the Imprisonment and Detention Law 31 of 1978 prohibits "any assault whatsoever on prisoners and detainees" (Article 28), the same law explicitly sanctions methods of discipline that violate international standards, such as flogging, indefinite solitary confinement and deprivation of family visits and correspondence (Article 20). In addition to this legal sanction of flogging as a method of disciplining prisoners, flogging is also imposed by the courts as a punishment for a variety of crimes. Saudi security officials interviewed by Middle East Watch did not consider flogging or hitting detainees to extract confessions to be forms of torture or cruel or inhuman punishment.7

Despite royal orders instructing detention authorities not to torture prisoners - usually issued after the death of a detainee - there were numerous reports in 1991 of torture in Saudi detention facilities, especially those run by the secret and religious police. Recently, for example, the U.S. State Department has recounted "credible reports of injuries and the deaths of at least two, and possibly more, persons caused by beatings or the use of excessive force while being held in official custody. In addition, there was a credible report of the torture of several foreigners in Saudi military custody."8

The secret police, known as the Directorate of General Investigations (al-Mabaheth al-`Amma) has close to 150 detention facilities and unidentified "safe houses." Number of DGI places of detention fluctuates; some of them are villas leased for specific periods to house one or more prisoners. The religious police, known as the Association for the Propagation of Virtue and the Deterrence of Vice (Hai'at al-Amr bi al-Ma'rouf wa al-Nahi `an al-Munkar), popularly termed as the "Association," (al-Hai'a) or "the Zealots" (al-Mataw`a or Mutawwa`in), maintains more than two hundred stations throughout the kingdom.9

Contrary to Western perceptions, the religious police is not an organization of private vigilantes. Rather it is a government agency whose employees are regular civil servants. Members of this force impose adherence to what they take to be Islamic morality, including a strict dress code for women, and observance of times of prayers. They have been granted the power to arrest and detain and are issued bamboo sticks which they use for summary justice on the streets or inside their precincts. Their activities have especially increased since Mid-1991, including non-Muslims among their victims. According to the State Department, the U.S. protested to the Saudi authorities about some of the excesses of the religious police, and noted that the Saudi government "appeared slow to act to prevent recurrences."10

The difficulty of documenting torture in Saudi Arabia is compounded by the failure of the Saudi government to respond to reports of mistreatment of prisoners.11 For example, since Muhammed al-Fassi, a prominent Saudi citizen who fell out of favor, was detained in October 1991, there have been several international appeals on his behalf accusing Saudi authorities of torture. The Saudi government has not responded. A letter sent by Middle East Watch on November 1, 1991, to King Fahd seeking the government's response to these reports has not been answered. The Saudi government has also turned down requests to visit al-Fassi in detention. Indeed, with one notable exception, the Saudi government has never allowed independent observers to visit its detention facilities. The exception was to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit Iraqi POWs after the beginning of Desert Storm on January 17, 1991, after months of refusal.

Unpunished use of torture by members of the royal family was also reported in 1991. In July, the New York City police rescued Turki al-Yaqouti, a thirty-six-year-old Saudi member of the staff of Prince Khaled ibn Talal - a nephew of King Fahd - who was visiting New York at the time. According to a police account, al-Yaqouti "had clearly been tortured," with burns on his chest and both forearms and wrists. "It looked like somebody did a job on him," said one police official. The victim was taken to the New York Hospital Burn Center. But, since he decided not to press charges and since the police thought that the torture had probably taken place in Saudi Arabia, no charges were filed.

Three incidents of harassment of foreign workers in Riyadh were also reported to Middle East Watch. In all three cases, roving bands of junior princes and their bodyguards were responsible. The workers were attacked on the street apparently at random and severely beaten for sport. Those who reported the incidents to the police complained of official inaction.12

Executions and Corporal Punishments

The new laws do not ban arbitrary or extrajudicial executions. Nor do they provide safeguards for judicially ordered executions. The right to life is acknowledged as a basic right in the Saudi interpretation of the Shari`a. However, the Saudi government has in the past executed suspects without judicial sanction, giving the king the authority to impose the death penalty without trial.13 Moreover, in their imposition of the capital punishment, Saudi courts have not followed internationally recognized standards required for fair trials that are especially crucial in cases where the death penalty can be imposed.

While there were no reports of extrajudicial killings in Saudi Arabia during 1991 and 1992, judicially ordered executions resumed in May 1991 after an eight-month moratorium following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Although no official reason was given, the timing of the suspension suggested that it was designed to avoid the scrutiny of hundreds of foreign reporters and television cameras allowed into the country throughout the Gulf crisis. In May and June alone, twenty-two were executed, suggesting that a backlog of death sentences had built up in previous months. Those condemned to death had been convicted of murder or drug trafficking.

All judicial executions carried out in 1991 and 1992 violated internationally recognized due process guarantees. The only procedural rights allowed under Saudi regulations are the right to legal counsel before trial - if a suspect asks and can pay for it - and the right to confront one's accusers and contest one's pretrial confessions. However, defendants are not allowed legal representation in the courtroom, in clear violation of the principle set forth in Article 14(3)(d) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.14 Denial of legal representation in the court is especially objectionable considering that criminal laws are mostly unwritten. The accused thus requires vast knowledge of Shari`a to mount a credible defense. In addition, about one third of Saudi Arabia's population consists of foreigners who are even less familiar with the Shari`a and may be less able to defend themselves.

Most of those condemned to death in 1991 were first held in prolonged incommunicado detention for interrogation before family visits and meetings with legal counsel were allowed, while some never received legal counsel, either because they did not ask for it or because they could not afford it. A number of the drug-trafficking death sentences, moreover, were grossly disproportionate to the alleged crimes, which did not involve loss of life.

Corporal punishment continues to be applied for political offenses as well as common crimes. For example, in June 1991, Zuhair al-Safwani, a twenty-seven-year-old student, wassentenced to four years in jail and three hundred lashes for allegedly maintaining contacts with opposition groups outside the country. On December 6, 1991, two men (one Saudi and one Yemeni) convicted of stealing a safe had their right hands amputated in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia -- thus resuming another pre-crisis practice of amputating the hands of convicted thieves.15

There is nothing in the new laws to indicate that there would any limits on capital or corporal punishment in Saudi Arabia. By emphasizing the Shari`a as the basis of law, there is every indication that capital and corporal punishments regularly meted out by Saudi courts will continue, including flogging, amputation of hands and feet, gibbeting and the beheading of prisoners convicted under legal proceedings that fall well short of internationally accepted norms of fair trials.

Protection Against Ex-Post Facto Incrimination

Article 38 of the Basic Law stipulates that, "No crime and no penalty may be established except by virtue of Shari`a or law. No penalty may be imposed except for offenses committed after the relevant law has come into force." In theory these principles were never disputed by the Saudi government. But in practice they have been violated for two main reasons: the limited number of codified laws and the unchecked government authority to reinterpret these laws and the unwritten Shari`a principles. In the near absence of codified penal laws, the courts and government rely mainly on religious scholars' commentaries, based on the Hanbali school of Islamic jurisprudence, the majority of which were written in the Middle Ages. Most commonly used are treatises written by the fourteenth-century jurist, Ibn Taimiyya, who is considered the spiritual predecessor of the eighteenth-century Saudi religious fundamentalist reformer Muhammed ibn Abdel-Wahhab. The al-Saud dynasty based its initial rise to power in 1753, and its subsequent claims to rule, on its devotion to the teachings of Wahhabism, a strictly puritanical and fiercely proselytizing sect of Sunni Islam.

The King and the Council of Ministers have near absolute authority to interpret the written laws, as there is no constitutional court that might serve as an arbiter in case of dispute. The government-appointed Council of Senior Scholars, which represents the Wahhabi establishment clergymen, have authority to reinterpret the unwritten Shari`a laws. Some reinterpretations of the penal laws have been tantamount to applying ex-post-facto law. A case in point is that of suspects held in connection with acts of sabotage that took place in 1988. Twenty-six individuals were arrested on suspicion of bombing oil installations in the eastern industrial town of Al-Jubail. Denied legal representation during their trial, the twenty-six suspects were subjected to severe torture, according to credible reports from family members.

Four of the suspects were executed under the terms of Regulation No. 148 of 1989, an ex-post-facto regulation issued after their arrest, in clear violation of the principles codified in Articles 6(2) and 15 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Two others were released. The remaining twenty are still detained under the authority of the same regulation. The regulation was issued after the government secured a religious opinion (fatwa) from the Council of Senior Scholars, which redefined armed insurrection to include acts of terrorism andsabotage. It also allowed the imposition of the death penalty for such acts even if they did not cause loss of life.16

Safeguarding Privacy

According to Article 37 of the Basic Law: "Homes have sanctity; they shall not be entered without permission of its owners or searched except according to law." For this to be meaningful, a law must be passed requiring certain safeguards against arbitrary searches. There is no requirement under the Imprisonment and Detention Law of 1978, or any other law, that searches are conducted after securing a warrant from a responsible authority. In practice, while regular police may on occasion obtain authorization before conducting a search, homes are regularly raided by the secret police and the religious police without warrants. For example, recent arrests of fundamentalists in December 1991 and January 1992 were accompanied by unauthorized searches. According to a January 14, 1992 written statement by the mother of one detainee, Ahmed al-Abdani, the secret police searched her house without a warrant. When she asked whether they had been authorized, she was told: "We are the al-Mabaheth [as the secret police is popularly known]; we don't need authorization to search houses."

Article 40 institutes, for the first time in Saudi Arabia, the principle of privacy of communications: "Telegraphic, postal and telephone communications, and other forms of communications are protected. They shall not be confiscated, delayed, read or listened to except in the cases specified by law." This provision represents, on paper, an important step forward. But, as with other declared reforms, how effective its protections prove will depend on the law specifying the circumstances in which the principle of privacy can be waived. As it is now, all forms of communication in Saudi Arabia are routinely intercepted, without judicial authorization, by security forces, postal authorities and Ministry-of-Information censors.

Freedom of Expression

One of the most important lacunae in the new laws is the failure to recognize the right to freedom of thought or expression. Instead of recognizing freedom of the press, Article 39 of the Basic Law states that,

"Media and publishing organizations, and all other methods of expression, must adhere to good speech and to the laws of the state. They shall contribute to the education of the nation and support its unity. It is forbidden to publish anything that can lead to internal strife or division, or negatively affect the security of the state, or its public relations, or degrade man's dignity and rights, as specified by laws."

The laws to which this Article refers are very restrictive and fall far short of minimum universally accepted standards of free speech. For example, Articles 6 and 7 of the Law of Publications No. 17 of July 2, 1982, lists more than eighteen subjects that must not be addressed in any publication, including, for example, "anything that may touch on the dignity of heads of states or of chiefs of diplomatic missions accredited in Saudi Arabia, or adversely affect relations with other countries." Violators are subject to imprisonment or a fine or both (Article 38) and risk losing their licenses temporarily or permanently (Art. 34). These penalties are imposed administratively, by a committee formed in the Ministry of Information (Art. 40). This law subjects all publications, local or foreign, to pre-distribution censorship, leading to a complete ban on some publications. Those allowed to distribute in the country in principle may have particular issues confiscated or have their permits to distribute suspended for months at a time. When an issue is permitted into the country, some articles may be excised altogether or partially blackened.17

Newspapers published in Saudi Arabia are regulated by a special law, the Private News Organizations Law No. 62 of August 1, 1964, which gives the government the right to close down any news organization, "if the interest of the country requires it"(Art. 8). Officers of the news organization may have their positions terminated by the Ministry of Information on the same grounds (Art. 18). The editor-in-chief of a publication may also be similarly dismissed (Art. 28).

Radio and television are owned and operated by the Ministry of Information and reflect only views acceptable to the government. Since the government closed down all private radio stations in 1964, it has banned the operation of any independent radio or television station.18

During the Gulf crisis, Saudi authorities strictly enforced a ban on all public criticism of the government's policies. A number of prominent clergymen and theologians were prevented from speaking out, including Shaikh Safar al-Hawali and Shaikh Salman Fahad al-Awdah. Shaikh al-Awdah was arrested several times in 1991 and then restricted to the Qasim region, three hundred kilometers north of Riyadh, in an effort to enforce the ban. While the restrictionof his movement has not been rescinded, it was not strictly enforced after the end of the war. Dr. Muhammed al-Mas`ari, a professor at King Saud University who was sympathetic to the fundamentalist religious movement, was also prohibited from speaking publicly and for several months suspended from teaching.

Since October 2, Muhammed Shams al-Din Abdalla al-Fassi, a Saudi who is related by marriage to the royal family, has been held incommunicado after being arrested in Jordan and turned over to Saudi authorities.19 His family, which fears for his life, reports that he has been tortured and denied family visits and legal counsel. Al-Fassi incurred the displeasure of the Saudi government for, among other things, broadcasting his critical views of the Saudi government during the Gulf crisis on Radio Baghdad.

In an unprecedented move, Saudi Arabia granted visas to more than one thousand foreign reporters during the Gulf crisis. But the Saudi government and the Pentagon issued strict orders regulating the transmission of press reports. In addition to military censorship, reporters were instructed not to cover Saudi domestic issues.

Both Saudi and foreign reporters were arrested for unauthorized news coverage during the crisis. Saleh al-Azzaz, editor-in-chief of the monthly Tijarat al-Riyadh (Riyadh Commerce) and regional editor of the weekly al-Majalla (The Magazine), was arrested on November 6, 1990 and held until March 4, 1991 - shortly after the end the war. He was accused of attempting to pass to Western news organizations reports of the November 6 demonstration by Saudi women demanding the right to drive. There were numerous incidents in which reporters were beaten by Saudi forces or had their copy confiscated or film destroyed when they veered from the approved itinerary.20 Shortly after the war ended, Saudi Arabia returned to its pre-crisis practice of denying most visa requests from foreign reporters.

On May 28, 1991, in preparation for the annual Muslim pilgrimage al-Hajj, Saudi Minister of Interior Prince Nayef ibn Abdel Aziz issued a ban on using, displaying or bringing into the country "books, photographs, and leaflets of political, propagandistic or ideological aim." Aimed primarily at the Iranian pilgrims, permitted to return to the country for the first time since 1987 when a major disturbance left over four hundred dead, the ban was strictly enforced against all political literature and Shi'a religious documents.

On November 14, Abdel-Rahman al-Hassani, a Moroccan journalist and editor-in-chief of the weekly Hadihi al-Dunia (This World), was expelled from Saudi Arabia without beinginformed of the reasons.21 He attributes the expulsion to a combination of suspicion that he was distributing publications deemed politically objectionable to Saudi authorities and requests by the Moroccan government to expel him because of a critical column he had written in 1986 about Moroccan judges.22

During December 1991 and January 1992, scores of fundamentalist opponents were also rounded up by the secret police. They were apprehended and have been held incommunicado without due process of law, on suspicion of preaching against government policies. In addition, since December 13, 1991, a number of fundamentalist leaders have been banned from travel abroad, including Sulaiman Fahd al-Awdah, `Ayedh Abdalla al-Qarni, Dr. Safar al-Hawalli, and Dr. Ahmed Othman al-Tuwaijri. The first three are popular fundamentalist teachers whose critical audio cassettes are clandestinely distributed in the country and the fourth is the dean of the College of Education at King Saud University. Around the same time, Shaikh Abdel-Muhsin al-Obaikan, an elderly religious judge in Riyadh, was also banned by a government order from delivering sermons or speaking out in public.

Freedom of Assembly

The new legislation does not recognize a right to peaceful assembly. Under Saudi regulations, all demonstrations are banned unless expressly sanctioned by the government; such sanction is given only after authorities are satisfied that they would be in support of government actions or policies. During 1991, the police forcibly dispersed peaceful demonstrations on several occasions. On March 22, Saudi National Guardsmen forcibly dispersed a two-thousand-strong peaceful demonstration that took place in al-Qatif, a predominantly Shi`a town, in support of Grand Ayatollah Abu al-Qasem al-Khoei. Imam al-Khoei - one of the highest-ranking Shi`a clergymen in the world and highly revered by the Saudi Shi`a population - had just been detained by the Iraqi government. The demonstration was thus against Saddam Hussein and could have been construed as supportive of Saudi government policy. This purpose notwithstanding, the official Saudi government ban on all demonstrations, especially those organized by the Shi`a community, meant that many of the participants in the demonstration were beaten and arrested. A similar, but smaller, demonstration organized in the eastern city of al-Dammam on March 29 met with a like response from security forces.

Freedom of Association

The new law does not change the long-standing ban on free association. Trade unions are banned under the terms of a 1956 royal decree that outlawed labor strikes and the collectiveorganization of workers. Political organizations are also banned. Those suspected of membership in an opposition political party risk arrest, torture and lengthy incarceration. During 1988 and 1989, twenty-five persons were arrested and accused of membership in Munadhamat al-Thawra al-Islamiyya (Organization of Islamic Revolution), a Shi`a organization. All were later adopted by Amnesty International as Prisoners of Conscience. During the same period, twenty were held on suspicion of belonging to Hizb Allah fi al-Hijaz (Party of God of al-Hijaz), another Shi`a organization. During 1989, six were arrested for alleged membership in Hizb al-`Amal al-Ishtiraki (Socialist Action Party).23

Other forms of social or apolitical association require licenses, which are regularly denied or revoked. When allowed, an association is required to make available to the government its minutes and membership list. It is banned from contacting foreign organizations or participating in international conferences without express permission from the royal court.

Discrimination Against Women

The new laws do not explicitly ban discrimination based on gender and most likely they will be understood by both fundamentalist groups and the religious establishment as not offering protection against such discrimination. Specifically, the new laws state that the constitution of the country is the Shari`a, which is interpreted by the government-appointed clergy, and by the government as a whole, as to permit the denial of certain rights to women, including the freedom to travel and equal access to employment and education. According to this interpretation, even "moderate beating" of a disobedient wife is allowed.

Recent developments in Saudi Arabia underscore the inherently discriminatory nature of official Saudi policy towards women in travel, employment and education. By law, women are not allowed to travel within the country or abroad without being accompanied by a male relative. When using public transportation within cities, women are restricted to using the rear of a bus, separated from male riders in the front. Women are also banned by law from employment in most public and private enterprises, except in those few circumstances in which the employer is able to provide a completely gender-segregated work environment. Technical and vocational training is off-limits to women except in health trades. Access to university education is controlled by strict limits in almost all fields, with some professional schools completely barred to women.

Before November 1990, women had been banned in practice, but not by law, from driving in Saudi Arabia. However, when forty-seven mainly professional women challenged this custom on November 6, 1990 by driving their own cars in Riyadh (having secured driver licenses in other countries), the move backfired badly. All the women were arrested. Released the same day into the custody of their male relatives, the women had their passports confiscated and were suspended from any public job they had held, including a number of university professorships. Faced with uproar from the religious establishment and other fundamentalists, Prince Nayef, theInterior Minister, later issued an order formally banning driving by women, thus making a hitherto implicit ban explicit in law.

In November 1991, passports were returned to the women and, according to reports received by Middle East Watch from those personally familiar with the case, the women were quietly given back pay and promised that they would be able to return to their former positions. It remains to be seen whether this promise is actually carried out. Meanwhile, the government has made clear that it will continue to punish those who try to challenge the officially sanctioned policy of gender-based discrimination.

Religious Discrimination

Predictably, the Basic Law of Government does not contain any reference to freedom of thought or religion. Objection to the principle of freedom of religion was cited by the Saudi government as one of the main reasons behind its refusal to sign international instruments of human rights. Rather than establishing boundaries between religion and the state structure, the Basic Law explicitly declares that the Shari`a is the constitution of the country and the basis of legislation and authority. Government-appointed clergy, chosen from among the Wahhabi establishment, are assigned the task of interpreting the Shari`a. Under this legal arrangement, sects other than Sunni Islam as understood by the strict Wahhabi branch of the Hanbali school are not treated as equal.

There has been long-standing discrimination against Saudi Arabia's Shi`a Muslim minority as a consequence of Shaikh Muhammed ibn Abdel-Wahhab's teachings. This eighteenth-century cleric, who started the puritanical movement upon which the al-Saud family has based its legitimacy, believed that Shi`a are outside the pale of Islam.24 Shi`a are the largest minority in the country; although there has been no official census, estimates range from two to seven percent of a total population of fifteen million.25 They are concentrated in the oil-producing Eastern Province, where their share of the native population is more significant.26

The policy of discrimination intensified, for political reasons, after the 1979 Iranian revolution and the subsequent Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988). However, since 1991, official harassment of Shi`a has been eased, but it is too early to determine whether this represents a trend. There were several reasons for the easing of repression. Shaikh Hassan Mousa al-Saffar, a leading Saudi Shi`a cleric, supported the Saudi war effort against Iraq in statements he madefrom his place of exile in Syria.27 Improved Saudi-Iranian relations and the Saudi government's need to close ranks at home also played a role. In addition, during 1991, it was Sunni fundamentalists rather than the Shi`a who voiced the strongest opposition to the presence of foreign troops in the country, and thus most evoked government wrath.

As a result of this detente, previous practices of close surveillance of Shi`a towns, raids by security forces, intimidation and public humiliation, all of which had been common, were largely stopped during 1991. Saudi Aramco, the government-owned oil company and the largest employer of Shi`a in the country, reopened its recruitment offices in Shi`a towns after years of inactivity. However, the number of new recruits was small despite the vast expansion of oil production and the flight of many foreign oil workers occasioned by the 1990-91 Gulf crisis caused by Iraq's occupation of Kuwait. Moreover, the policy started in the mid-1980s of displacing senior Shi`a executives at Aramco continued, according to Aramco employees interviewed by Middle East Watch.

Two petitions submitted to King Fahd by Shi`a notables in 1991 complained about a ban on the use of religious tracts required for the exercise of Shi`a religious rites. The notables also protested restrictions imposed on Shi`a university admissions, the ban on military service by Shi`as, and the difficulty faced by the community in trying to secure jobs with government agencies or government-owned companies.28 Shi`a believe that denying them military service casts doubt over their loyalty. In addition, in Saudi Arabia there is considerable popular demand to join the military, in part because of the significant privileges to which members of the armed forces are entitled. Since Saudi Arabia maintains one of the smallest armies in the region relative to its population, induction into the army is very much sought after.

The Shi`a are still banned from public displays of their religious customs on occasions such as `Ashura, a major day of mourning, outside areas where they are a majority. In Shi`a towns themselves, certain religious practices, such as ritual self-flagellation, are banned.

In a disturbing sign of persistent attitudes in high circles, on September 30, 1991, Shaikh Abdalla ibn Jibreen, a member of the government-appointed Council of Senior Scholars, issued a fatwa that Shi`as are "idolaters deserving to be killed." The fatwa, for which he has not been censured publicly, reflects the view of the Sunni religious establishment, although not necessarily the government as a whole. Two previous opinions by the ifta' committee of the Council of Senior Scholars had already stated that Shi`a "are apostates who have committed grand idolatry."

The government has provided the atmosphere in which such extreme views can be expressed. Government-issued public school texts denigrate Shi`a beliefs, describing them as heretical and blasphemous.29 In a deeply religiously society, such government-sanctioned or condoned claims are virtual incitements to violence against the Shi`a.

In March 1992, Mulla Turki Ahmed al-Turki and Abdel-Khaleq al-Jenini were reportedly detained by the Directorate of General Investigations at the campus of King Abdel-Aziz University in Jidda, apparently after they engaged with a professor in a discussion about Shi`a beliefs. The discussion centered around a university-approved textbook that was taken to insult those beliefs.30

Non-Muslim residents in Saudi Arabia also face official discrimination. They are not allowed to practice their religions in public, display religious symbols, or import religious books. During the Gulf war, this matter was one of the thorniest restrictions on U.S. and allied troops, although special exemptions were allowed to accommodate the foreign armies camped on Saudi soil for up to nine months. After the war, the strict enforcement of the ban on non-Muslim worship was resumed. According to a report by the U.S. Department of State, a clandestine Christian religious service was broken up by police who arrested many of those attending, including children.31

Rights of Refugees

Article 42 of the Basic Law is vague about the rights of refugees; it notes: "The state grants political asylum when public interest requires it. Saudi laws and international agreements shall govern rules and procedures of extradition of common criminals." In other words, Saudi Arabia's interest, not that of the asylum seekers, shall determine whether or not a refugee is granted asylum in the country. Saudi practice has not always adhered to the principle of non-refoulement: foreign residents have been frequently expelled to countries where they risk death, grave danger, or persecution for political beliefs.32

During the Gulf crisis, Saudi Arabia allowed international human rights organizations relatively free access to interview refugees from Kuwait. Access to Iraqi refugees has been more restricted but not banned in principle.33

Iraqi refugees who were evacuated by U.S. troops from southern Iraq to Saudi Arabia after the failure of the March 1991 uprising have found the Saudi government less than hospitable. While the government has been paying the full cost of the refugee camps, it restricts the movement and communications of the refugees. In addition to the 23,000 civilian refugees in the Rafha camp, there are 14,000 former prisoners-of-war who are kept in the al-Artawyiyya camp.34 The latter lost their POW status in August 1991 after the ICRC ascertained that they did not wish to return to Iraq. Both groups of refugees are kept in isolated camps in remote towns surrounded by Saudi security forces. While these forces provide protection for the camps, they also deny the refugees access to the outside world. While refusing to allow the refugees to leave the camps to other places inside Saudi Arabia, the Saudi government for months did nothing to facilitate their resettlement in other countries.

Most of the Iraqi refugees in Saudi Arabia are veterans or supporters of the religiously-inspired Shi`a rebellion in southern Iraq. Despite this, the Saudi government sends Sunni preachers from the Wahhabi school, which is especially hostile to the Shi`a branch of Islam, to proselytize amongst the refugees. These zealous preachers have distributed in the camps publications branding the Shi`a creed as blasphemy.

The conditions under which these refugees were living, the mutual hostility between guest and host and the lack of progress on their resettlement led to serious clashes in April and December 1991, leading to the death and injury of scores of refugees. In September, Saudi Arabia formally asked the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to help in the resettlement of Iraqi refugees who did not wish to be repatriated.35

In December 1991, there were reports that Saudi authorities rounded up hundreds of Iraqi refugees who were deemed "trouble makers" and forcibly repatriated them to Iraq, thus violating the non-refoulement principle of refugee law. Over 280 Iraqi refugees, most of whom were political dissidents, were reportedly forced to leave to Iraq, despite the grave danger they facedupon returning to Iraq. Earlier in the year, hundreds of Somalis were deported and sent by ship to Somalia where they too faced great risks.36

Following the liberation of Kuwait, many of its foreign residents, facing persecution at the hands of the restored Kuwaiti government, sought to leave the country through Saudi Arabia. But the Saudi government for several months refused to allow them to pass through its territory. The effect of this policy, for those who did not want to risk the dangerous passage through Iraq, was to limit the possessions that they could take with them to items that could be carried as personal luggage on an airplane.37

Summary Deportation

Under Article 36 of the Basic Law, "The state shall provide security for all its citizens and residents. It is prohibited to restrict the actions of any one, detain or imprison him except according to law." We saw that the Imprisonment and Detention Law of 1978 provides very little protection against arbitrary arrest and lengthy administrative detention. Alien residents face another risk: summary deportation.

Under the Alien Residence Regulations, aliens can be summarily deported by order of the minister of interior or his deputies; regional governors; or the head of the Passports and Nationality Agency, his deputies or his regional representatives. Deportation orders are issued automatically for violations of the stringent visa and residence regulations. They are also issued upon recommendation of the police or the Directorate of General Investigations. In addition, since work visas are contingent upon continued employment, foreign workers are usually forced to leave immediately or face deportation once their employers notify immigration authorities of the termination of their contracts. Summary deportation, or the threat of it, is used by unscrupulous employers to get their employees to forgo certain rights they may be entitled to under labor law or the terms of their contracts.

During their stay in Saudi Arabia, the movement of foreign workers is severely restricted. An alien is required to surrender his passport to his employer. At the same time, aliens are required to carry their passports to be allowed to travel within the country. Consequently, a foreign worker may not travel within the country or abroad without the permission of his employer, providing the latter with additional leverage.

Summary deportation, without a hearing of any kind, is carried out regularly in Saudi Arabia, in violation of international human rights standards. Article 13 of the InternationalCovenant on Civil and Political Rights states that, "an alien ordered deported shall have the right to have his case reviewed by, and be represented before, a competent authority."

During the fall of 1990 and the spring of 1991, summary deportation reached unprecedented levels when the government decided to cancel the waivers Yemeni workers had been granted from visa requirements. The decision was taken in retaliation for the Yemeni government's tilt toward Iraq during the Gulf crisis and in response to Yemeni press criticism of Saudi policy in the crisis.

On September 22, 1990, the Saudi government abruptly ended the preferential treatment previously extended to Yemeni guest workers, including permission to work without a sponsor (kafil) and to operate businesses without a Saudi partner. Workers were given one month - later extended by another month - to find a sponsor, and businessmen were given three months to find Saudi partners. Close to one million out of the 1.5 million Yemenis in Saudi Arabia - many of them having lived most of their lives in the Kingdom - were unable to adjust to the new procedures in the short time allowed and were ordered out of the country. Departing Yemenis were, in practice, forced to leave behind much of their property.38

Under the new procedures, thousands of Yemeni workers were detained in 1991 and most were deported without the opportunity for judicial review. In early 1992, residents of Riyadh reported to Middle East Watch that Yemenis were still being arrested on sight, even if they held valid permits. Those able to prove their compliance with the new requirements were usually released, but many of them were subjected to ill-treatment while being interrogated.

1 See the appendix for texts of these two petitions.

2 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1991, February 1992, p. 1579.

3 Middle East Watch interviews, New York, April, 1992; Riyadh, August 1990; Jiddah, October 1990; Dhahran, March 1991.

4 This problem became especially acute after the 1973 dramatic rise in land prices in Saudi Arabia.

5 Article 53 refers to the Board of Grievances, discussed in the following paragraph.

1 In Saudi government nomenclature, the phrase civil rights (al-huquq al-madaniyya) refers to private civil claims filed against other private citizens; hence the Ministry of Interior's Department of Civil Rights. Ironically, this department has been frequently implicated in violating human rights, in its zeal to protect property rights.

2 Ministry of Information, Proceedings of Conference of Saudi Scholars and European Lawyers on Islamic Law and Human Rights, Riyadh: Ministry of Information Press, 1972, p. 15 (in Arabic).

3 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Diplomatic Studies Institute, Human Rights: Western Claims and Islamic Authenticity, Riyadh, 1986 (in Arabic).

4 According to a January 14, 1992 statement made by the mother of one of the detainees, Ahmed al-Abdani, the secret police searched her house without a warrant. When she asked whether the secret-police action had been authorized, she was told: "We are the al-Mabaheth [as the secret police is popularly known]; we don't need authorization to search houses." Nor did the police inform the family of the charges against the detainee, according to her statement. See below, in the section on freedom of expression, for other recent examples of incommunicado detention without charges or trial.

5 Middle East Watch interview with an officer of the International Committee for Human Rights in the Gulf and Arabian Peninsula, April 21, 1992. According to the April issue of al-Jazeera al-Arabia (The Arabian Peninsula), an opposition monthly, two of the Shi`a released were Ali al-Amrad and Sharaf al-Sada.

6 Article 11 of the Covenant provides, "No one shall be imprisoned merely on the ground of inability to fulfil a contractual obligation."

7 Middle East Watch interviews, August 1990; March 1991.

8 Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1991, February 1992, p. 1577

9 The two estimates of the number of detention facilities were given at the request of Middle East Watch by a senior security official.

10 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1991, February 1992, p. 1577.

11 According to the State Department's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1991, (February 1992, page 1577), "It is general government policy not to respond to such reports."

12 All three cases were reported to Middle East Watch to have taken place in 1991 in al-`Olayya, an upper middle class section in the north of Riyadh.

13 A case in point was the execution in 1980 of 63 rebels who were captured after a bloody armed insurrection. Then-King Khaled ordered them beheaded without trials. Senior members of the royal family have, at times, taken the law into their own hands over family matters. In 1978, Prince Muhammed, King's Fahd's older brother, ordered the killing of his daughter and her common fiance after they had attempted to flee the country without family approval.

14 However, defendants in nonpolitical cases are allowed legal counsel outside the courtroom, and a defendant who does not speak Arabic is allowed to have a translator in the courtroom who in practice can be a lawyer.

15 Le Monde, December 10, 1991, quoting the Saudi daily Arab News of Jiddah.

16 Despite the Saudi government's contention that this regulation was not a new law but merely an interpretation of existing Shari'a prohibition against terrorism, many in Saudi Arabia believed that it was a departure from long-standing practice. The regulation allowed judges to impose the death penalty on those who commit acts of sabotage against "essential utilities such as oil pipelines and oil installations whose functioning is essential for the safety of citizens or the security of the nation." The regulation did not require that the sabotage result in loss of life for the death penalty to be imposed. While the Qur'anic phrase on which the regulation relies is admittedly ambiguous, it had been long-standing practice that the range of punishments for armed insurrection (hiraba) spelled out in the Qur'an (ranging in severity from exile to execution) be calibrated to the severity of the harm caused, with the maximum penalty reserved for acts of insurrection that result in loss of life. (Middle East Watch interviews, August 1990; Muhammed Mufti and Sami al-Wakil, Islamic Political Theory of Human Rights, Qatar: Al-Umma Publications, 1990, p. 43, in Arabic.)

17 In 1990, the distribution of several issues of Time, Newsweek, and the French weekly Le Point was banned. Similarly, in 1991, issues of The Economist were not allowed into Saudi Arabia. After the December 21, 1991 issue of The Economist was barred, the magazine itself was blacklisted indefinitely. See, Attacks on the Press, the 1990 and 1991 annual reports issued by Committee to Protect Journalists, New York.

18 There have been two minor exception to this rule. Between 1964 and 1976, the government allowed the operation of a television station by Aramco, the oil company that was then American-owned but has since 1976 been nationalized. The other exception was that during the Gulf crisis in 1990-1991, the United States Armed Forces Radio was allowed to operate in Saudi Arabia.

19 Muhammed al-Fassi's sister is married to Prince Turki ibn Abdel Aziz, King Fahd's brother and a former deputy minister of defense. Shams al-Din al-Fassi, Muhammed's father, had been detained in Saudi Arabia for several years without charge, reportedly for holding unpopular religious views. In October 1983, a plot to kill Shams al-Din al-Fassi was uncovered in London. In October 1984, Walter Martindale, a former U.S. State Department official, was convicted in U.S. federal court on several gun-possession charges in connection with the plot, and was sentenced to ten years in prison. Martindale maintained during the trial that the plot had been masterminded by Prince Nayef ibn Abdel Aziz, the Saudi minister of interior and another brother of King Fahd.

20 See, e.g., Committee to Protect Journalists, Attacks on the Press 1991, March 1992, pp. 167-9.

21 The newspaper was started in Morocco in 1966. In 1986, it moved its offices to Greece. During 1990-91, its editors were in Saudi Arabia and Greece but it was printed in Athens and distributed from there.

22 The article had prompted the Moroccan Ministry of Interior to file formal criminal charges. According to an order issued in 1989 and apparently still in force, he is accused of "affront to the supreme dignity of Moroccan justice" and his name "is at all times and from now on officially listed at all Moroccan borders."

23 Amnesty International, "Saudi Arabia: Detention without Trial of Suspected Political Opponents," January 1990, AI Index: MDE 23/04/89. Although a number of detainees were accused of committing violence, for most the main offense was membership in a political organization.

24 This extreme position is not shared by the overwhelming majority of Sunni Muslims. It has its genesis in the teachings of Ibn Taimiyya, a fourteenth-century puritanical Syrian cleric.

25 Unofficial estimates suggest that the native population of Saudi Arabia is close to two-thirds of the total population. Between three to eleven percent of the native population could therefore be Shi`a by faith.

26 There are also smaller Shi`a communities in `Asir Province, near the Yemeni border, and in Medina, the second holy city.

27 Interestingly, al-Saffar's comments on the newly-introduced laws have been skeptical, describing them as "empty of any real content and a disappointment to the hopes of citizens. These laws do not promise any political reform and do not entail any change in the system of government. They merely put the reality of the system in writing and give it the appearance of constitutional legitimacy." Al-Jazeera al-Arabia (The Arabian Peninsula), March 1992, p. 29.

28 The complaint about job discrimination mentioned Aramco (the oil company), Petromin (the oil-distribution network), SABIC (Saudi Arabian Basic Industries Company, the petrochemical conglomerate) and the Eastern Province Power Company.

29 One such example is the government-issued, and the only one approved, theology textbook of the final year in high school. This subject is required for graduation from high school. The text book, written by Shaikh Saleh al-Fawzan, was approved in early 1992 for the current academic year.

30 Al-Jazeera al-Arabia, April 1992, p.17

31 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1991, p. 1583

32 Non-refoulement is a universally accepted principle of refugee law. Under Article 33.1 of the 1951 Refugee Convention, "No Contracting State shall expel or return ("refouler") a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion." Although Saudi Arabia has not ratified this convention, the principle of non-refoulement is considered part of customary law binding on all nations.

33 In the case of prisoners-of-war, the Saudi government refused to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to visit Iraqi soldiers who surrendered between August 1990 and January 17, 1991, the day Desert Storm started. Saudi officials claimed that those soldiers were not prisoners-of-war to be treated according to the Third Geneva Convention. Instead, they called them "military refugees" and promised to treat them humanely, "as brothers." Under considerable international pressure, however, after the start of the war, Saudi Arabia gave the ICRC full access to prisoners-of-war.

34 Rafha is a small town near the Saudi-Iraqi border; al-Artawiyya is a village 180 miles south of the border and 150 miles north of Riyadh.

35 Little progress has been made because of logistical problems and failure to find a third country willing to take the refugees.

36 State Department Country Reports 1991, p. 1583; Middle East Watch interviews, February 17, 1992.

37 The policy, which Saudi Arabia instituted upon the liberation of Kuwait on February 26, 1991 was amended by the end of October, according to reports received by Middle East Watch. However, Middle East Watch continued to receive other reports through November, from Palestinians wishing to leave Kuwait but were not allowed to pass by land through Saudi territory. Since then, most of those leaving Kuwait by land have chosen to go through Iraq since the roads became less dangerous.

38 Saudi border guards required proof of purchase for items taken out of the country by departing Yemenis, in many cases a very difficult requirement to fulfill. In addition, ostensibly to make sure that the goods taken were for personal use and not resale, the quantities allowed across the border were limited.