A father's plea for his son's life

Dear Tracy, 
Thank you again for adding your name to Amnesty International's urgent appeal for Ali al-Nimr, a young activist facing imminent execution in Saudi Arabia. You’ve joined hundreds of thousands of people around the world in speaking out for Ali.

Please help keep up the pressure by sharing the petition with your family and friends:

Share

Tweet

Ali's situation is more urgent than ever. We have just confirmed that Ali was placed in solitary confinement in a Riyadh prison on October 5. Ali’s family has not has not been able to visit him, nor have they heard any news about his situation since then.

Ali and two other young activists, Dawood al-Marhoon and Abdullah al-Zaherwho, were all under the age of 18 when they were arrested at different times in 2012 after participating in anti-government rallies. They were all sentenced to death in 2014, and their sentences were upheld by Saudi Arabia’s appeal court and the Supreme Court earlier this year. And all now find themselves in solitary confinement. Ali, Dawood and Abdullah all state they were tortured and denied access to a lawyer during their interrogations, raising further grave concerns about the legal proceedings in their cases.

Media reports that Ali could face crucifixion after his beheading have sparked a global outcry. On October 14, his mother, Nusra al-Ahmed, appealed to US President Barack Obama to step in to save her son.

Now Ali’s father, an activist and social worker, is appealing to have his son freed spared from this awful, unjust sentence. Mohammed al-Nimr shared his family's anguish in a Newsweek blog:

 In our minds, we see him every day – on the stairs, jumping up two or three steps at a time – in the basement, where he used to go when he felt bored.

... His bed has not been made since 15 February 2012, the day he was arrested. That day, an armoured police patrol car ran him over... I asked time and again about the legitimacy of such a sentence in international conventions and treaties signed by my country. Do such treaties allow individuals to be arrested for having a different opinion? Do these instruments permit running children over with armoured vehicles?

Read Mohammed al-Nimr's full letter

Thank you again for joining our efforts, and for sharing this with others to help us press the Saudi Arabian government to respect human rights and spare Ali's life.

In solidarity,

Hilary Homes
Campaigner, Middle East & North Africa
Amnesty International Canada 

P.S. Want to do more? Send a tweet, fax or urgent letter to the King of Saudi Arabia.