Imprisoned Saudi Activist and Other Rights Defenders Seek Justice in 2021

By Mandeep TiwanaNEW YORK, Jan 19 2021 (IPS) Two events generated significant interest and global solidarity in the final days of December 2020. A court in Saudi Arabia handed down a five years and eight months sentence to activist Loujain Al-Hathloul for publicly supporting women’s right to drive. Nicholas Opiyo, Ugandan human rights lawyer and defender of persecuted members of the LGBTQI community and political opponents of the president was arbitrarily detained on trumped up charges of ‘money laundering.’ Nicholas Opiyo was granted bail on 30 December following an outpouring of global support for his activism for justice. In handing out the verdict to Loujain Al-Hathloul, the court partly suspended her sentence raising hope that she might be released from prison in a couple of months due to time already served. As we await the release of Loujain Al-Hathloul and an end to judicial harassment of Nicholas Opiyo it’s notable that their struggles for justice are not unlike those of Sudha Bharadwaj, general secretary and voice of conscience of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties in Chhattisgarh, India or that of Teresita Naul, sixty-three year old committed advocate for health and social services in the Philippines. In Honduras, the Guapinol Water Defenders exposing harmful mining activities should have been receiving a national award. Instead, like Nicaraguan economic justice activist Maria Esperanza Sanchez Garcia and their fellow human rights defenders above, th...
Source: IPS Inter Press Service - Health - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: Active Citizens Civil Society Crime & Justice Democracy Economy & Trade Gender Global Headlines Health Human Rights Humanitarian Emergencies Labour LGBTQ Middle East & North Africa TerraViva United Nations Source Type: news