RABAT (Dispatches) – A human rights watchdog called on Morocco on Friday not to extradite a Shia Muslim to his homeland of Saudi Arabia, citing fears he could face torture and an unfair trial there.
Hassan al-Rabea, who has been in Morocco since last summer, has been held in a prison near Rabat after being arrested at Marrakech airport on Jan. 14, Human Rights Watch said in a statement.
Saudi prosecutors accuse Rabea of leaving the kingdom illegally with the help of ‘terrorists’, the campaign group added.
Saudi Arabia did not immediately respond to a request for a comment. It has denied previous accusations that it practices torture and conducts unfair trials.
Rabea’s case will be examined by a Moroccan court, which will submit a verdict on the legality of his extradition before a final decision is made by the government, a Moroccan judicial source said.
Shia activists in conservative Saudi Arabia, say the government has cracked down on their minority community for years.
“The Moroccan government should stand for rights and resist Saudi efforts to forcibly return him,” Human Rights Watch said.
In 2021, Morocco extradited Osama al-Hasani, a dual Australian-Saudi citizen, to Saudi Arabia in a case that concerned rights groups.
Since de facto ruler Mohammed bin Salman grabbed the coveted chair, the kingdom has arrested a number of activists, bloggers, intellectuals, and others seen as political opponents, showing zero tolerance for dissent even in the face of global outcry.
In another development, Saudi authorities have forcibly disappeared a high-ranking military commander amid attempts by bin Salman to eliminate his political opponents, dissidents, human rights advocates and potential rivals to the throne.
Saudi activist Abdul Karim Abdul Kheil in a post published on his Twitter page wrote that senior security officials and military figures in Saudi Arabia are frequently liquidated in the midst of power struggles between the kingdom’s princes.
Abdul Kheil pointed to the case of Lieutenant General Saud bin Abdulaziz bin Hilal, a former Saudi interior ministry official, noting that his whereabouts and fate remain shrouded in mystery.
The activist highlighted that bin Hilal, who held several senior security positions, was known to have close ties with former Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Nayef, who the incumbent Mohammad bin Salman saw as his most formidable challenger.
Bin Hilal’s connections with senior members of the ruling Al Saud family and former authorities made him easy prey after King Salman removed bin Nayef as crown prince and replaced him with his son, bin Salman, in June 2017, Abdul Kheil stressed.
The report comes after a human rights organization sounded an alarm over the fate of political dissidents incarcerated in Saudi jails.
In its latest report, Sanad human rights organization, which monitors and exposes human rights violations in the Arab country, said civil rights activists and scholars feel threatened if they express their opinions or make critical comments.