\n<\/p>\n
A London-based Saudi dissident who a judge decided should receive more than \u00a33m in damages from the kingdom for assault and the hacking of his phone has insisted that it must pay up or face enforcement action.<\/p>\n
Mr Justice Saini ruled that the Saudi government infected the phone of Ghanem al-Masarir with Pegasus spyware and, while surveillance was continuing, in 2018, its agents attacked him outside Harrods in central London.<\/p>\n
It was a landmark judgment, holding to account a regime that has faced numerous allegations of human rights abuses but has consistently managed to avoid legal responsibility for abuses.<\/p>\n
However, with the Saudi government having long refused to participate in the case after failing to have it thrown out on the grounds of \u201cstate immunity\u201d, the big question is whether it will comply with the order to pay al-Masarir damages.<\/p>\n
In an interview with the Guardian, the 45-year-old satirist and human rights activist said: \u201cI hope they will comply and pay the debt as soon as possible. If they don\u2019t pay it, we won\u2019t have any other alternative but to take enforcement action to recover the money from Saudi assets abroad, it doesn\u2019t have to be the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n
The bulk of the damages \u2013 about \u00a32.5m \u2013 was for loss of earnings as he had previously had, in Saini\u2019s words, a \u201cthriving and lucrative\u201d career, creating content critical of the Saudi government. However, al-Masarir continues to experience severe depression as a result of being targeted, leaving him unable to work.<\/p>\n
The Saudis have made no comment on Monday\u2019s judgment nor indicated whether they will pay the compensation. Nevertheless, al-Masarir, who was granted asylum in the UK in 2018 and citizenship last month, described Monday\u2019s high court judgment as an \u201camazing thing, them being liable in a court of law. This judgment sent a signal they should not intervene inside the UK and it will not be tolerated.\u201d<\/p>\n
Referring to attempts by Prince Mohammed to get the then foreign minister, David Cameron, to intervene in the case, revealed by the Guardian last year, al-Masarir said: \u201cThey think they can hide behind state immunity and force the UK to interfere in the legal system. That happily didn\u2019t work and justice has been served. In Saudi they can interfere with their legal system but not here. It is an independent legal system.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Citizen Lab, at the University of Toronto, which tracks digital attacks against civil society, established in 2018 that al-Masarir\u2019s phone had been infected as well as other critics of Saudi Arabia, including his friend the Canadian-based dissident Omar Abdulaziz, who was also friends with their fellow dissident Jamal Khashoggi.<\/p>\n
<\/span>The Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was killed in 2018.<\/span> Photograph: Osman \u00d6rsal\/Reuters<\/p>\n Among previous legal actions against the Saudis that have floundered were a US lawsuit accusing Mohammed bin Salman of conspiring to kill Khashoggi, which was dismissed on the basis that the Saudi crown prince was entitled to sovereign immunity, despite the judge finding \u201ccredible allegations\u201d that he was involved in the murder.<\/p>\n Saini ruled that there was \u201ceffectively criminal conduct\u201d by the Saudis against al-Masarir, albeit proven on the balance of probabilities, which is the lower standard of proof in civil cases. \u201cI thought I would be safe in the centre of London [but] they were able to locate me and send their agent to attack me,\u201d said al-Masarir.<\/p>\n \u201cWe all know what happened to Jamal Kashoggi, how far they are willing to go and, in my case, how they were willing to send their agent to attack me in the streets of London and to hack my phones, even though it\u2019s an independent and sovereign country. So I don\u2019t know if they will stop, I hope this will deter them and hold them accountable and I hope they will not do it any more to anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n The court heard that al-Masarir had suffered \u201ccatastrophic personal consequences\u201d, rarely leaves the house and cannot carry out many basic day-to-day activities. \u201cI suffered a lot and what they have done to me has ruined my life,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not the same person I was 10 years ago, I am a different person, I can\u2019t do my work. I haven\u2019t visited the same place I was attacked [since] \u2013 that is seven years. It\u2019s too painful to see.\u201d<\/p>\n He has little faith in the much-trumpeted political reforms in Saudi Arabia, referring disparagingly to last year\u2019s controversial comedy festival in the kingdom featuring the likes of Louis CK, Dave Chappelle and Jimmy Carr. \u201cAt the same time they have attacked me \u2013 I\u2019m a comedian as well,\u201d he said. \u201cIt shows you how hypocritical they are.\u201d<\/p>\n He said that, whether they paid up or not, the Saudis had got what they wanted, stopping him from creating the satirical shows that have clocked up almost 350m views on YouTube: \u201cIt\u2019s a win for them because they silenced me and I\u2019m not able to do my work any more.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A London-based Saudi dissident who a judge decided should receive more than \u00a33m in damages from the kingdom for assault and the hacking of his phone has insisted that it must pay up or face enforcement action. Mr Justice Saini ruled that the Saudi government infected the phone of Ghanem al-Masarir with Pegasus spyware and,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":43218,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[919,12717,3823,7208,22474,5081,3716,11191,899],"class_list":{"0":"post-43217","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-crime-justice","8":"tag-action","9":"tag-arabia","10":"tag-awarded","11":"tag-damages","12":"tag-dissident","13":"tag-enforcement","14":"tag-paid","15":"tag-saudi","16":"tag-threatens"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43217"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43217\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/43218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}