An American citizen has been sentenced to 16 years in prison in Saudi Arabia for tweeting critically about the Saudi regime, in another sign of the kingdom’s aggressive crackdown on any whiff of dissent posted on social media.
Saad Ibrahim Almadi, 72, a dual US-Saudi national, was arrested in November 2021 upon landing in Riyadh for what was supposed to be a two-week stay in his native country for a work and personal trip.
The case is now the second known incident of a Saudi who was living abroad being arrested upon their return for using social media.
Salma al-Shehab, a Saudi student living in the UK and attending Leeds University, was sentenced to 34 years in prison for having a Twitter account and following and retweeting dissidents and activists. She was arrested and convicted after returning home for a holiday.
In Almadi’s case, prosecutors focused on 14 tweets that the American published over a seven-year period while he was living in Florida, including posts that referenced Jamal Khashoggi, the Washington Post columnist who was murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018. » | Stephanie Kirchgaessner in Washington | Tuesday, October 18, 2022
