JEDDAH, 5 December 2007 — The National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) came out in support of residents who are seeing their homes demolished as part of a municipal crackdown on buildings that have been constructed illegally.

The house owners, who do not have title deeds, argue that local officials are ignoring orders from higher authorities to stop the demolitions in the Harazat district of Jeddah.

The human rights group has demanded that the Municipal Committee to Evict Squatters produce paperwork showing how the decision to demolish the homes was made, NSHR spokesman Hussein Al-Sharif said.

Salim Al-Ahmari, owner of a demolished house, said that the homes were electrified following orders from “higher authorities”, which implies that there has been some sort of concession that these people have been permitted to remain there.

“Several of the houses here are electrified on the basis of orders from higher authorities even though their owners did not have the title deeds,” said Al-Ahmari.

According to Al-Ahmari’s estimation, the present municipal operations incurred a total loss of more than SR5 million to the residents in the area. He added that several children have missed school because their fathers were under police custody, Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper reported yesterday.

Al-Sharif said he sent an urgent message to Makkah Gov. Prince Khaled Al-Faisal requesting him to take appropriate steps as the residents of the area were complaining of the demolition of their houses where they were living with their families for several years.

Sharif said the 23 detainees included the old and sick and were held without food or water for more than seven hours. They were later taken to the demolition sites as part of the investigations.

Police reportedly denied permission to the NSHR, which wanted to visit the prisoners and guarantee that they were not abused or starved. He said during a visit to the demolition site the NSHR found that the constructions were not recent.

Several of the houses were very old and others renovated, Sharif said.

The residents told the NSHR that no city official had ever told them that their constructions were illegal. “We also demand that the governorate should ... provide these poor families with alternate arrangements instead of sending them to streets even if the municipal committee were acting under valid orders,” said Sharif.