LONDON – Saudi Arabia’s widely-lauded reforms are no more than a publicrelations blitz aimed at masking Riyadh’s rights record and are “foolingnobody”, Amnesty International said on Thursday.
Saudi Arabia, a key US ally and the world’s largest oil exporter, began toease its ultraconservative policies following the rise to power of CrownPrince Mohammed bin Salman, the 32-year-old heir to the region’s mostpowerful throne.
“Saudi Arabia’s aggressive publicity drive to rebrand its image, tarnishedby a ruthless crackdown on freedom of expression and a bombing offensive inYemen, is fooling nobody,” Amnesty said in a statement.
The kingdom has launched a major image overhaul, lifting bans onentertainment, including cinemas, public music festivals and tourism, andscaling back restrictions on women.
The London-based rights group published a preview of a mock PR job advert– slated to run in The Economist and a number of Dutch media outlets onFriday.
It features a photograph of a beheading and the blistering caption: “Ifthis is how your country delivers justice, you need a really, really goodPR agency”.
Riyadh leads a military alliance fighting against Yemeni rebels in a bloodywar that has left nearly 10,000 dead since 2015 and pushed Yemen to thebrink of famine.
The Saudi-led alliance was blacklisted by the UN last year for the killingand maiming of children.
Amnesty singled out Prince Mohammed in its critique of Saudi Arabia’spolicy changes over the past nine months.
“The Crown Prince has been cast as a reformer but the crackdown againstdissenting voices in his country has only intensified since his appointmentlast June,” said Samah Hadid, Director of Campaigns for AmnestyInternational in the Middle East.
“The best PR machine in the world cannot gloss over Saudi Arabia’s dismalhuman rights record”.
Amnesty International has also said the human rights situation has”deteriorated markedly” since Mohammed bin Salman took over as crown prince.
Authorities in the kingdom have long drawn harsh criticism from rightsgroup over the targeting of human rights activists and political dissidents.
Dozens of Saudi citizens have been convicted on charges linked to dissentand under the country’s sweeping cyber crime law, particularly linked toposts on Twitter. – Agencies