Together for Justice recalls the case of young Saudi activist Abdullah Al-Mubaraki, who has now completed five full years of enforced disappearance since his arrest on 22 July 2021, when Saudi security forces raided his home in Yanbu and took him to an unknown location without presenting an arrest warrant or providing any explanation for his detention.
As of 23 July 2026, Al-Mubaraki has entered his sixth year in disappearance. Saudi authorities have still not disclosed his place of detention, his health condition, his legal status, or the nature of any charges against him. His family and legal counsel have also been denied access to him. This complete blackout cannot be treated as ordinary detention; it amounts to an ongoing enforced disappearance for which the Saudi authorities bear full responsibility.
Available information indicates that Al-Mubaraki’s arrest was linked to his peaceful activity on social media, where he called for political reforms, accountability, justice, and respect for citizens’ basic rights. No violent activity or incitement has been attributed to him. His continued disappearance therefore exposes the use of enforced disappearance as a tool to punish peaceful opinion and silence young voices calling for reform.
Five years without public disclosure, legal clarity, family contact, or a fair and open judicial process constitute a grave violation of his right to liberty and security of person, as well as his right to due process and fair trial guarantees. Holding a person in an unknown location and cutting them off from the outside world creates a dangerous environment in which torture, ill-treatment, and coerced confessions may occur.
Together for Justice stresses that any future legal proceedings against Abdullah Al-Mubaraki cannot be considered legitimate if they follow years of disappearance, denial of legal representation, denial of family contact, and lack of independent oversight. Any statements or confessions obtained during such conditions must be treated as inherently unreliable and potentially coerced.
Al-Mubaraki’s case is not isolated. It forms part of a wider pattern in Saudi Arabia, where arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance are used against activists, opinion-holders, and young people who use digital platforms to express peaceful political and human rights demands.
Together for Justice holds the Saudi authorities fully responsible for Abdullah Al-Mubaraki’s life, physical safety, and psychological well-being. The organization calls for the immediate disclosure of his whereabouts, health condition, and legal status, and for his family and lawyer to be allowed immediate and unrestricted access to him.
The organization also calls for his immediate and unconditional release if no clear and lawful charges are publicly presented, and for an independent investigation into the circumstances of his arrest and disappearance since July 2021. Those responsible for his disappearance and the denial of his basic rights must be held accountable.
After five full years, Abdullah Al-Mubaraki’s family still has no answers. His fate remains hidden behind the silence of the Saudi authorities. That silence does not erase the violation; it confirms it. A young Saudi man disappeared after expressing his views, and has now entered his sixth year without trial, without disclosed charges, and without a trace.