ALQST for Human Rights’ submission to the United Nations Human Rights Council on the 4th cycle of Saudi Arabia’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR), documenting the deteriorating human rights situation in the kingdom since the last UPR in 2018.
General overview
ALQST’s report shows how the rights situation in Saudi Arabia has continued to worsen since the last UPR, with further arrests and unprecedentedly long jail sentences for citizens peacefully exercising their right to freedom of expression; ongoing abuse of prisoners of conscience; and gross violations of the rights of residents, notably members of the Huwaitat tribe, in the context of massive state-backed development schemes such as the Neom megacity project. The oppressive male guardianship system remains in force, restricting the lives of Saudi women, despite the government’s formal acceptance of UPR recommendations to abolish it. Furthermore, the Saudi authorities have neither cooperated meaningfully with international human rights mechanisms nor yet ratified international treaties that they agreed, in the previous UPR cycle, to ratify.
