ALQST has learned of the arrest on 14 August 2021 of Abdulwahhab al-Dowaish, son of the preacher Sulaiman al-Dowaish who has been forcibly disappeared since 2016. Abdulwahhab, who was arrested previously in June 2017, had received a phone call from the Saudi authorities asking him to go to the Naif College for National Security in Riyadh, supposedly to have the electronic tag removed from his ankle. However, as soon as he arrived he was informed that he had to spend the remainder of his sentence, amounting to eight months, in prison.
Abdulwahhab al-Dowaish was originally arrested in 2017 after an argument with an official at the Interior Ministry to whom he had gone to seek the release of his father. In the course of the argument Abdulwahhab told the official: “We love our father dearly; either release him or put us in prison with him.” The following day, a number of civilian cars surrounded Sulaiman al-Dowaish’s family home, where all his children lived. Abdulwahhab was then arrested and forcibly disappeared for three months, after which his family were able to visit him in prison and saw he had clearly been tortured. A source told ALQST that Abdulwahhab was tortured for three months and forced under duress to make confessions, and because he was in such poor physical condition he was moved to the prison hospital for treatment before being returned once again to the main prison.
Abdulwahhab was subsequently put on trial on charges including support for Islamic State (IS) and holding extremist ideas, although the Public Prosecution failed to produce any evidence for this. He was released before his trial began in March 2018, and was sentenced in September 2020 by the Specialised Criminal Court, Saudi Arabia’s terrorism court, to three and a half years in prison with eighteen months suspension, to be followed by a travel ban of similar duration.
ALQST still does not know where Abdulwahhab is now being held, or whether his latest arrest is related to the earlier case or comes in reprisal for a report published in the Wall Street Journal in May this year. In any case, ALQST calls on the Saudi authorities to release Abdulwahhab al-Dowaish immediately and unconditionally and drop all charges against him.
ALQST still does not know where Abdulwahhab is now being held, or whether his latest arrest is related to the earlier case or comes in reprisal for a report published in the Wall Street Journal in May this year. In any case, ALQST calls on the Saudi authorities to release Abdulwahhab al-Dowaish immediately and unconditionally and drop all charges against him.
