Amnesty focus on Saudi rights abuse

The harrowing story of how Irish nurse Ms Monica Hall spent three years in a Saudi prison - much of it waiting to know if she would be executed - was recounted at Dublin's Mansion House yesterday to mark the start of a campaign to end human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia.

Launching the Irish arm of the campaign, Amnesty director Ms Mary Lawlor said the aim was to "force Saudi Arabia to acknowledge and abide by conventions on human rights while also exposing the silence of the international community on the issue".

Ms Lawlor said the timing of the launch was important as "ironically and almost unbelievably the Saudis are considering putting themselves forward for a position on the United Nations Human Rights Committee".

The Saudis attempted to cover with a "shroud of secrecy" "torture, human rights abuses, floggings, amputations and executions", and because these punishments were regularly handed out to non-nationals the international community was fully aware of them, she maintained.

Because of the "secrecy and silence", human rights violations often go unrecorded, and in this light Amnesty was fortunate to have Ms Hall, who had gone through the Saudi prison system, to tell her story, she said.

According to Amnesty International's Irish branch chairman Mr Seamus Shiels, Saudi Arabia is an influential member of the international community, not just because of the country's oil reserves but because of the wealth it holds in foreign economies.

Ms Hall said the prison in which she was held was filthy and overcrowded, and women who were there with their children were regularly taken out and flogged.