Raif Badawi (born 13 January 1984) is a Saudi blogger and founder of the website Free Saudi Liberals, a thorn in the side of the royal family and Islamic authorities. In 2014, he was sentenced to ten years in prison, a fine equivalent to 226,000 euros, and a thousand lashes. On 11 March 2022, Badawi was released after 10 years. However, he was given a 10-year travel ban, which means he cannot travel to his wife and children in Canada, among other places.
Laureate Difference Day Honorary Title for Freedom of Expression 2015
In 2006, Saudi author, writer, blogger and activist Raif Badawi launched the website Free Saudi Liberals, which served as an important platform for Saudi liberals for many years. The site advocated freedom of expression in the autocratic kingdom and questioned some of the basic principles of life in Saudi Arabia, such as the role of religion in society and the logic behind the requirement that all Saudis must believe in Islam. Despite his Muslim faith, he argued that Islam cannot explain everything and that people should be free to believe in whatever religion they want. Badawi also strongly criticised Saudi Arabia's highly influential morality police, which cracks down on what it considers to be violations of the country's strict Islamic customs. Badawi was repeatedly forced to take the forum offline, but he kept putting it back online.
On 6 December 2008, the blogger was prevented from leaving the country at Jeddah airport when he attempted to travel to Beirut. In 2011, charges were brought against Badawi for attacking religious values. Raif was arrested a year later on charges of insulting Islam through electronic channels and was brought before the court on various charges, including apostasy. In 2014, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison, a 10-year travel ban, a fine of 1 million Saudi riyals (238,000 euros) and 1,000 lashes, the first 50 of which were administered publicly on 9 January 2015. People all over the world campaigned for Raif Badawi. More than a million messages were sent in support of his case. Although this did not lead to his early release, his flogging was not resumed after the first session.
Raif was finally released in March 2022. But his punishment is far from over: he is not allowed to leave his country for 10 years and therefore remains separated from his family. His wife Ensaf fled abroad with their son and two daughters. Since then, they have only been in contact by telephone. The children are now teenagers and live with their mother in Canada. Because Ensaf had to promise her husband not to tell their children about his sentence, they only found out when Raif was publicly flogged.
Badawi wrote about his experiences in the book 1000 Lashes: Why I Say What I Think. In a letter to the German weekly Der Spiegel, the blogger described undergoing the punishment. The day his wife Ensaf told him that a major publisher was interested in compiling his articles into a book, he hesitated. He simply could not imagine them appearing in a book. At that moment, he saw himself only as the emaciated man who endured fifty lashes while a group of bystanders celebrated his pain and chanted Allahu Akbar.
Many organisations, such as Amnesty International, have campaigned for years for Badawi's release, and in the same year that he received the Honorary Title from the VUB and ULB, he was also awarded the Sakharov Prize. With this prize, the European Parliament honours people who are committed to human rights and fundamental freedoms. Waleed Abulkhair, the lawyer who defended Badawi during his trial, was convicted after setting up a human rights organisation and sentenced to 15 years in prison for undermining the regime, incitement and insulting the judiciary. He is still in prison.
Sources: VUB Today, Amnesty International.
