| Founded | August 2014 (2014-08)[1] |
|---|---|
| Founder | Yahya Assiri[2] |
| Focus | research and advocacy for human rights in Saudi Arabia[1] |
| Location | |
Area served | Saudi Arabia[3] |
| Method | researchinghuman rights in Saudi Arabia based on Saudi Arabia based team and publishing documentation and news reports by London team; "lobbying against [human rights violations] using peaceful and legal methods"[3] |
Key people | Yahya Assiri[3] |
| Website | alqst |
ALQST[1][3] orAl Qst[2] (Arabic:منظمة القسط) is ahuman rights organisation that documents and promoteshuman rights in Saudi Arabia, with a team in Saudi Arabia that researches cases and a team in London that publishes reports and news.[1]
ALQST was founded in August 2014 byYahya Assiri, a formerRoyal Saudi Air Force officer,[2][4] with the aim of documenting human rights violations in Saudi Arabia and publishing reports on these.[1] Assiri described the choice of the name as deliberately using a term from theQuran that means "justice", in order to avoid the organisation being perceived asattacking Saudi Arabian culture.[2]
As of 2023,Lina al-Hathloul, the sister ofLoujain al-Hathloul, is ALQST's head of monitoring[5] and advocacy.[6]
In February 2018, ALQST opposed the conviction and sentencing of Issa al-Nukheifi, who was sentenced to six years' imprisonment, to be followed by a six-year international travel ban and social media ban, for havingtweeted his criticism of Saudi authorities for theSaudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen and against official handling of "criminal proceedings and security procedures".[7]
ALQST has documented the detention of women's human rights activists, including the wave of arrests that started with the detention of Noha al-Balawi in January 2018, who was questioned during her detention for her women's rights activities.[8] Al-Balawi was the first in a 2018 wave of arrests of women's rights activists involved in thewomen to drive movement and theanti male-guardianship campaign.[9] ALQST described the series of arrests as an "unprecedented targeting of women human rights defenders"[9] whileUnited Nations special rapporteurs called them a "crackdown".[10]
In August 2018, ALQST called for the dropping of charges againstIsraa al-Ghomgham, a human rights advocate especially known for her documentation of and participation in theQatif unrest that started in 2011 and continued during2017–18.[11] ALQST stated that the prosecutor in al-Ghomgham's case had requested that she besentenced to death for what ALQST described as "her involvement in peaceful rights activism".[12]
In September 2018, ALQST reported thatSalman al-Ouda, a Saudi Muslim scholar who had in 1993 co-founded theCommittee for the Defense of Legitimate Rights, a Saudi opposition group,[13] risked the death penalty forlèse-majesté in a court case against him in theSpecialized Criminal Court.[14]
In 2018,France 24 and ALQST reported on the use ofTwitter and other online social networks bykafala system employers, "kafils", to "sell" migrant domestic workers to other kafils, in violation of Saudi law. ALQST described the online trading as "slavery 2.0".[15]
In October 2018, ALQST joined 160 other civil society organisations in calling for an independent international investigation into theassassination of Jamal Khashoggi and for Saudi Arabia to be suspended from theUnited Nations Human Rights Council.[9]
In its second annual conference in December 2018, ALQST released a report summarising the human rights situation during the reign of KingSalman. ALQST described the beginning of the reign as a "period of repression unprecedented both in its scope and its range of methods, exceeding in intensity anything seen before in previous eras." ALQST listed human rights violations including "excessive use of armed force – including artillery – in a densely-populated residential area" during the2017–19 Qatif unrest, theSaudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen, and theassassination of Jamal Khashoggi.[16]
ALQST divided waves of arrests during 2017–2019 into three waves.[16] The 10 September 2017 arrests ofSalman al-Ouda, Abdullah al-Maliki, Essam al-Zamel and other academics, intellectuals, media professionals and religious leaders constituted the first wave. The second wave was the2017 Saudi Arabian purge that started on 4 November 2017, in which several hundred prominent Saudi Arabian princes, government ministers, and business people were detained.[17][18] ALQST defined the third wave as the2018 crackdown on women involved in thewomen to drive movement and theanti male-guardianship campaign and their male supporters.[16] The women were detained and several of them were tortured.[19][20]
