Loujain al-Hathloul

Loujain al-Hathloul (لجين الهذلول Lujjayn al-Hadhlūl; born 31 July 1989) is a Saudi women's rights activist, a social media figure, and political prisoner.

She has been arrested on several occasions for defying the ban on women driving in Saudi Arabia.

On 1 December 2014, she was arrested and detained for 73 days after an attempt to cross the border in her car from the UAE to Saudi Arabia, on charges related to defying the female driving ban in the kingdom.

She had a UAE driver's license but the Saudi police still arrested her.

Al-Hathloul attempted to stand in Saudi local elections in December 2015, the first vote in Saudi Arabia to include women, but was barred.

In September 2016, along with 14,000 others, al-Hathloul signed a petition to King Salman asking for the male guardianship system to be abolished.

On 4 June 2017, she was arrested and detained at King Fahd International Airport in Dammam.

The reason for the arrest was not officially disclosed, although Amnesty International believed it was for her human rights activism, and al-Hathloul was not allowed access to a lawyer or any contact with her family.

In May 2018, she and several prominent women's rights activists were kidnapped in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and deported to Saudi Arabia where they were charged with "attempting to destabilise the kingdom."

Her husband, Saudi stand-up comedian Fahad al-Butairi, had also been forcibly returned from Jordan to the Kingdom and was under arrest.

Loujain Al-Hathloul was kidnapped from UAE in March 2018 and deported to Saudi Arabia, where she was arrested for a few days and then put under a travel ban.

Al-Hathloul was detained again on the eve of 15 May 2018, along with Eman al-Nafjan, Aisha al-Mana, Aziza al-Yousef, Madeha al-Ajroush and some men involved in campaigning for women's rights in Saudi Arabia.

Human Rights Watch interpreted the purpose of the arrests as frightening "anyone expressing skepticism about the crown prince's rights agenda".

In June 2018, women were granted the right to drive in Saudi Arabia, while al-Hathloul remained under arrest.

According to ALQST and Amnesty International, Saudi Arabia tortured al-Hathloul and several other women detained for their women's rights activities.

Torture techniques, which included being beaten on their feet, given electric shocks, and whipped, were used in a torture location called "the hotel" or "the officer's guesthouse".

According to Loujain al-Hathloul's sister Alia (who lives in Brussels, Belgium), torture techniques used specifically against Loujain also included beating, electric shocks and waterboarding, and the torture occurred between May and August 2018.

Loujain al-Hathloul's parents stated that Loujain's "thighs were blackened by bruises" when they visited and that Loujain "was shaking uncontrollably, unable to hold her grip, to walk or sit normally" during their visit.

According to Alia al-Hathloul, Saud al-Qahtani visited al-Hathloul during her torture, laughing at her, threatening to rape and kill her and to dispose of her body in the sewage system, and he tortured her "all night during Ramadan".

Alia al-Hathloul stated that she had expected that under Saudi norms about women, her sister would not have been tortured.

In December 2018, al-Hathloul was in jail with her fellow activists at Dhahban Central Prison.

For her women's rights activism, Al-Hathloul has been awarded the 2019 PEN America /Barbey Freedom to Write Award and the 2020 Václav Havel Human Rights Prize.

She is one of Time magazine's "100 Most Influential People of 2019".

She was released from prison on 10 February 2021, but lives under a travel ban.

She is a graduate of the University of British Columbia.

Al-Hathloul is known both for her role in the women to drive movement and in opposing the Saudi male guardianship system.

According to her brother Walid al-Hathloul (who lives in Ontario, Canada), al-Hathloul was by February 2019 held in al-Ha'ir Prison.

On 1 March 2019, the office of Saudi Arabia's public prosecutor announced that the preliminary investigation had been completed and they would be preparing to try al-Hathloul and other activists in court for undermining state security.

On 13 March 2019, the trial began, although the charges were not specified and reporters and diplomats were barred from attending.

In April 2019, a hearing on her case was postponed without a reason being given.

In May 2020, her trial was indefinitely postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has raised concerns over her health inside the Saudi prison.

On 11 August 2020, her other sister Lina al-Hathloul (a Nobel Peace Prize-nominated campaigner), expressed fear about the possibility of the activist being tortured again in the Saudi prison, as she has not been heard from for over 60 days.

Loujain al-Hathloul had been held in incommunicado detention for three months.

When she learned that other detainees were allowed to call their families, she went on a six-day hunger strike to demand the same.

She was then allowed to meet her parents.

Saudi Arabia has restricted many prominent human rights activists, clerics, and royal family members from contacting their family or lawyer, raising concern over their safety and wellbeing.

On 15 September 2020, around 30 countries called on Saudi Arabia to release jailed women's rights activist Loujain al-Hathloul and four other women in detention who campaigned for women to drive.

On 8 October 2020, the European Parliament called for Saudi Arabia to release all the human rights activists, particularly the campaigners for the Women to drive movement, including Loujain al-Hathloul, in a resolution passed against the Kingdom's human rights records.

Highlighting the situation of these dissidents and migrants in the country's detention centers, the MEPs also urged the European Union states to cut down their representation at Saudi's G20 Summit.

At the end of October 2020, Loujain al-Hathloul started a hunger strike.