JEDDAH, 7 March 2004 — A leading Saudi lawyer has been awarded a major honor by Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II.
Salah Al-Hejailan has been made a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) in recognition of his role since 1976 as honorary legal adviser to British ambassadors to the Kingdom.
Al-Hejailan said that he believed the award was meant to encourage recent improvements in Saudi Arabia’s legal system, in addition to recognizing his efforts in defending British nationals. “I was honored because of the strength of the defense I gave for British citizens” charged with crimes in the Kingdom, Al-Hejailan said.
But the decision to award him a CBE was also a message of “support for the legal improvement and reform taking place in Saudi Arabia,” he said. The award from the British monarch will be conferred in Riyadh in the second half of this month. Al-Hejailan, 62, had to have the authorization of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd before becoming “Salah Al-Hejailan CBE”.
He defended, mostly without remuneration, British citizens on many occasions. The two most celebrated cases were two British nurses accused of murdering a colleague, who were ultimately deported in 1998, and that of five Britons granted a royal pardon in August 2003 after being convicted of involvement in bombings and alcohol smuggling. Two of the latter along with a Canadian, amnestied in the same case last August, are now suing Saudi officials, claiming they were tortured into confessing, a claim Saudi Arabia rejects.
The new CBE is not sympathetic either.
“This file is closed. They were lucky to be deported,” Al-Hejailan commented.
