Earlier today, the Riyadh Criminal Court held the fourth hearing session for the ongoing trial of prominent human rights defenders and reformists Mohammad al-Qahtani [1] and Abdullah al-Hamid [2]. The first two hearing sessions [3] were public, but when the judge decided to hold the third hearing session behind closed doors, they decided to leave [4].
The two reformists agreed to attend today's session to try to persuade the judge to make this political trial public.
Dr Al-Qahtani tweeted:
@MFQahtani [5]: #ACPRA_Trial took two hours, it was spent on discussion about necessity of trial publicity, judge refused, we refused to acknowledge court.
@MFQahtani [6]: #ACPRA_Trial presiding judge asked us to answer questions, we told him we only answer if a public trial is held, we walked out #Saudi #ACPRA
They also cited the case of imprisoned activist Mohammad al-Bajady [7] who was sentenced to four years in prison in a secret trial last April:
قلت للقاضي اليوم لا نستطيع أن نتنازل عن مبدأ العلانية لأننا نصحنا زميلنا #محمد_البجادي بعدم الإعتراف بالمحكمة الجزائية المتخصصة #محاكمة_حسم
@MFQahtani [8]: I told the judge that we cannot waive our right to a public trial because we have advised our fellow [reformist], Mohammad al-Bajady, to not recognize the legitimacy of the [secret] Specialized Criminal Court.