Jakarta Globe – AFP, Jan 14, 2015
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| Ensaf Haidar, center, the wife of the Saudi Blogger Raef Badawi, holds a vigil in Montreal, Quebec on Jan. 13, 2015 urging Saudi Arabia to free her husband who was flogged in public on Jan. 9, 2015 near a mosque in the Red Sea city of Jeddah, receiving 50 lashes for ‘insulting Islam’. (AFP Photo/Clement Sabourin) |
Montreal.
The wife of a Saudi blogger who was publicly flogged for “insulting Islam”
called for his release on Tuesday.
“My
husband, Raef Badawi, is imprisoned for simply expressing liberal ideas,” Ensaf
Haidar, who sought asylum in Canada with her three children after Badawi was
arrested, told a news conference in Montreal.
In
September, a Saudi court upheld a sentence of 10 years in prison as well as the
1,000 lashes for Badawi, who has been behind bars since June 2012.
The
31-year-old received the first installment of 50 lashes last Friday and is
expected to have 20 weekly whipping sessions until his punishment is complete.
“We’re here
so that he won’t have to endure another 50 lashes next Friday,” said Beatrice
Vaugrante of Amnesty International.
“We talk a
lot about freedom of speech nowadays: I am Charlie, I am Raef Badawi,” she
said. “This concerns Canada, it concerns all Western nations that advocate
freedom of expression.”
The
Canadian government has called the public lashing “inhumane” but said it was
limited in what it could do for Badawi beyond expressions of outrage as the
blogger is not Canadian.
Agence France-Presse
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Protesters
demand the immediate release of Saudi blogger,
Raif Badawi, in front of the
Saudi Embassy in The Hague.
Photograph: Martijn Beekman/EPA
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