An 34 year old Saudi Student from Leeds University, Salma al-Shebab was sentenced to 34 years in prison for having an account on Twitter and following and retweeting protesters.
A mother and two children was detained in the month of January 2021, while traveling at Saudi Arabia just as she was planning to return home to United Kingdom, where she was a doctoral graduate at the University of Leeds.
Daily Mail reports that she was accused of using Twitter to cause public discontent and to dest@bilise national and civil security' following her tweets calling for women's right within Saudi Arabia.
Al-Shebab Shebab, who has two sons who are between four and 6, had been sentenced to six months in prison, but an Saudi Terr@rism court last Monday, increased the prison sentence to 34 years following she appealed against her sentence.
The woman is also believed to be facing a travel ban of 34 years at the end of her sentence in jail.
In its sentence the court noted Al-Shebab's social media activities in which she posted tweets to promote female rights within Saudi Arabia and expressed solidarity with activists for women's rights imprisoned like Loujain al-Hathloul. She also demanded their release.
Al-Shebab was detained after she retweeted an article from the sister of Al-Hathloul Lina that read"Freedom to Loujain Al-Hathloul ... The freedom of all prisoners. My first wish for the New Year Happy New Year.'
The accused was accused of 'giving assistance to those who want to undermine public order and threaten the security of the general public and the stability of the government, as well as posting false and unsubstantiated gossip via Twitter'.
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