Saudi Women’s Rights Activist Loujain al-Hathloul is Sentenced to Nearly Six Years in Jail

Loujain al-Hathloul, a prominent women’s rights activist in Saudi Arabia who was at the forefront of the campaign to overturn the ban on women driving, has been sentenced under a counterterrorism law and given a five-year travel ban. She was detained in 2018.

Many outlets have reported that Loujain al-Hathloul has been subjected to torture and sexual abuse well being behind bars.

United Nations human rights experts have called the charges against her spurious, and along with leading rights groups and lawmakers in the United States and Europe have called for her release.

The detentions of women activitsts occured shortly before and after the kingdom lifted a ban on women driving, which many activists had long championed, as part of reforms introduced by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that were also accompanied by a crackdown on dissent and an anti-corruption purge.

Hathloul’s sentencing came just nearly three weeks after a Riyadh court jailed U.S.-Saudi physician Walid al-Fitaihi for six years, despite U.S. pressure to release him, in a case rights groups have called politically motivated.