Saudi Justice: Report Card Needed

(New York, May 28, 2003) -- A year after the introduction of reforms to its
criminal justice system, the government of Saudi Arabia should publicly
disclose the concrete steps it has taken to improve safeguards against
longstanding abuses, Human Rights Watch said today. The kingdom's new
criminal procedure code became law in May 2002.

The Saudi government does not allow international human rights groups to
conduct investigations in Saudi Arabia, so independent assessments of the
code's implementation are not possible.

In a memorandum to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, Human Rights Watch identified
eight areas in which the rights of criminal suspects have been systematically
violated. These include the use of torture and threats to obtain confessions,
a lack of judicial response to individual allegations of mistreatment, and
holding trials without the notification or participation of defense lawyers.

The new criminal procedure code includes a prohibition against torture and
degrading treatment, as well as recognition of the right to a lawyer during
criminal investigations and trials.The memorandum was sent to Crown Prince Abdullah on May 6 and made public
today.

"The new criminal procedure code contains some important improvements, but
it's not clear whether they're being implemented," said Hanny Megally,
executive director of the Middle East and North Africa division of Human
Rights Watch. "The Saudi government should answer to some fundamental
questions about how the justice system works now."

In January 2003, the Saudi government for the first time allowed an official
Human Rights Watch delegation to visit the kingdom. The reform of the
criminal justice system was one of the main areas of discussion with Saudi
ministers and other senior officials.

In its memorandum to Crown Prince Abdullah, Human Rights Watch criticized the
practice of holding suspects in prolonged incommunicado detention, when
interior ministry operatives typically conduct abusive interrogations, and
called for the prompt access of lawyers and family members to detainees.
Human Rights Watch also highlighted the interior ministry's practice of
forcing detainees to sign pre-release statements that they were not
mistreated and that they will remain silent about the details of the
interrogation process. This practice should be immediately investigated and
discontinued, Human Rights Watch said.

Human Rights Watch also recommended that all judges in the kingdom be
instructed to order investigations if suspects credibly allege during trials
that torture or other abuse was used to coerce confessions, as required by
the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading
Treatment or Punishment. Saudi Arabia became a party to this treaty in 1997,
and its provisions can be invoked before Saudi courts.

Closed trials should be the exception and not the rule in Saudi Arabia, and
interested parties-including families, defense lawyers and other legal
representatives, and consular officials-should always be informed of the
place and date of trials, Human Rights Watch said. In no case should legal
representatives be prevented from attending a trial and representing their
clients.

The Human Rights Watch memorandum cites the Canadian government's complaint
in April 2002 about the trial and appeal proceedings of its citizen William
Sampson, one of the seven foreigners accused of carrying out bombings against
Westerners in 2000 and 2001. is trial "was held in secret and even
[Sampson's] lawyer was not informed," the foreign affairs department said it
had learned. "Mr. Sampson was not legally represented at the two subsequent
appeals either. The Saudi authorities have assured us Mr. Sampson would have
legal representation, and there were no suggestions that the trials would be
held in secret." It took Canadian authorities three more months to obtain
official notification from the Saudi government that Sampson had in fact been
secretly tried and sentenced to death.

"Transparency in the criminal justice system is an important benchmark of
reform, and authorities should make clear how the public can obtain
information about criminal trial proceedings and court judgments," Megally
said.

Article 182 of the new criminal procedure code states that if a trial has
been conducted in closed session, the court's judgment should be read in an
open session. It indicates that the public has a right to the most pertinent
information about all trials, including "the name of the rendering court, its
date, names of the judges, names of the litigants, the crime subject of the
action, a summary of claims or defenses submitted by the litigants and the
supporting evidence and arguments, the stages of the action, the text of the
judgment, reasons and legal bases thereof, and whether it was rendered
unanimously or by majority vote."

Human Rights Watch also expressed concern about the availability of legal
assistance for the thousands of people currently awaiting trial in Saudi
Arabia. In January 2003, the director of the interior ministry's prisons
administration, Major General Dr. Ali bin Hussein al-Harithi, told Human
Rights Watch that there were some 13,000 men and women in Saudi prisons who
had not yet been convicted. About 6,000 of them were migrant workers and
other foreigners.

The criminal procedure code establishes the right of every accused person to
seek legal assistance during investigation and trial, although it does not
explicitly guarantee the right to a lawyer for those who cannot afford one.
The government should explain the steps that have been taken to guarantee
this right, Human Rights Watch said. -keralamonitor.com