These days mark the eighth anniversary of the arrest of Saudi scholar Musa Al-Ghannami, who was abducted by the authorities in September 2017 as part of a sweeping crackdown that targeted dozens of academics, clerics, and human rights advocates—merely for supporting the Arab Spring revolutions and the peoples’ demands for freedom and justice, and for rejecting the logic of tyranny and repression.
Al-Ghannami is widely known for his firm opposition to extremist groups and for actively combating the very ideology the authorities claim to fight. Yet, he was arrested under the pretext of “communicating with foreign entities” according to the Saudi Counter-Terrorism and Terrorism Financing Law, a charge used as a cover to imprison him without trial or legitimate accusation.
Since the first day of his arrest, Al-Ghannami has been subjected to systematic violations: arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, complete denial of access to a lawyer, total isolation from his family, and a ban on visits or contact—an apparent attempt to cut him off from the world and break his will. Eight full years later, his fate remains suspended in an unknown cell, deprived of his most basic rights, with no clear charges and no public trial.
Despite repeated calls from local and international human rights organisations—including ALQST for Human Rights—to reveal his fate and release him immediately, the Saudi authorities continue to ignore all appeals in blatant defiance of the most basic principles of justice and the rule of law.
On this grim anniversary, Together for Justice reiterates its call for the immediate and unconditional release of Musa Al-Ghannami, an end to the policy of arbitrary detention targeting figures of thought, advocacy, and human rights work, and demands that he be granted full access to his legal and human rights until the moment of his release, alongside full disclosure of his place of detention and the circumstances of his arrest.