Amnesty accuses Saudi Arabia of repression

Amnesty International has accused Saudi Arabia of conducting a campaign of repression against protesters and reformists since the Arab Spring erupted, in a newly published report. “The last nine months has seen a new wave of repression in Saudi Arabia as authorities have cracked down on protesters and reformists on security grounds,” the rights watchdog said in a statement issued late Wednesday.
“While the arguments used to justify this wide-ranging crackdown may be different, the abusive practices being employed by the Saudi Arabian government are worryingly similar to those which they have long used against people accused of terrorist offences,” he said.
Saudi Arabia has been spared much of the unrest that has swept the Arab world this year and toppled autocratic leaders in three countries – Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. And Amnesty accused the authorities in the conservative Sunni kingdom of detaining “thousands of people, many of them without charge or trial, on terrorism-related grounds.”