Nassima Al-Sada: A Nobel Prize Candidate in Saudi Prisons

On December 26, 2020, Amnesty International (AI) launched a human rights petition calling for the immediate release of the Saudi detainee in Dhahban prison, Nassima Al-Sada , who was arrested on July 30, 2018.

AI called on all human rights activists to write about Al-Sada, explaining that her crime was calling the Saudi regime to allow women to drive cars, and to end the guardianship of men over women, as the concept of guardianship is being used to restrict the personal freedom of Saudi women, and to treat them like commodities, not like a human being entitled to live freely in society.

After detailing the violations Al-Sada is being subjected, the petition ended with “She does not see her children for months and she is not allowed to see her lawyer. AI called on all organisations and human rights defenders to sign the petition and share it.

Nassima Al-Sada

She is a Saudi writer and human rights activist, who participated in the 2017 protests in the city of Al-Qatif, and led many campaigns calling for the protection of civil and political rights and women’s rights. She ran for the 2015 Saudi municipal elections, however the regime excluded her.

On July 30, 2018, the Saudi state security forces arrested Nassima Al-Sada and the Saudi human rights activist Samar Badawi, as part of a widespread campaign of arrests carried out by the Saudi authorities with direct orders of the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, which targeted a number of clerics, young human rights and civil society activists and journalists.

In early 2019, Nassima was held in the General Intelligence Prison in Dhahban for a year, during which she was not allowed to see her three children, including two children with special abilities, and she was prevented from communicating with any lawyer to defend her.

Recently, a massive online campaign was launched to release the human rights activists detained in the prisons of the Saudi regime, headed by Nassima Al-Sada, who was considered by human rights activists on Twitter as a human rights icon in Saudi Arabia, social media users also wrote about many violations that she was subjected to, including torture and deprivation of seeing her children and as well as the deliberate insults and mistreatment in prison.

For its part, “Together for Justice” condemned the grave violations committed against the human rights activist Nassima Al-Sada, and called on the Saudi government to enable her to appoint a lawyer, allow visits, and grant her all her rights as a political detainee.

It has now been two years since Nassima -who was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize abroad- has been detained for more than two years in solitary confinement, without any charges or a fair trial, amid poor detention conditions, torture, insults and mistreatment.

Nassima has always been a symbol of those struggling for their rights, just like the rest of the detained or displaced women activists, whose dreams were not limited to driving cars only, but also for a free and democratic country, in which women are equal with men and all forms of racism are eliminated.

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