RIYADH: The new chief of the governmental Human Rights Commission (HRC), Bandar Al-Aiban, said in an interview with Arab News yesterday that Saudi Arabia welcomes criticism and, “looks forward to rectifying the possible points” made in a recent review of the status of human rights in the Kingdom by the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).
Al-Aiban, a former Shoura Council member, said the Kingdom is going through a period of change, and that the people are full of hope and determination to effect it.
“I was not able to fully review the responses and criticism that was addressed to the Kingdom after the UPR review in Geneva,” said Al-Aiban, referring to the so-called Universal Periodic Review, a mechanism of OHCHR to review the human rights conditions of all 192 members of the UN every four years, which is conducted by the UN Human Rights Council. Saudi Arabia is currently a member of this council.
The UPR commended Saudi Arabia on endeavors to raise awareness of women’s and children’s rights in the country, as well as raising awareness of the discrimination against the physically disabled. The report also commended the Kingdom on its progress in health care indicatives. But the UPR criticized the country on the practice of child marriage; treating minors who commit capital crimes as adults; job discrimination against women; maltreatment of guest workers; and the treatment of prisoners and persons in custody.
“I believe the Kingdom accepts criticism with an open heart and looks forward to rectifying the possible points,” said Al-Aiban. “Statistics talk of the changes and the development the Kingdom has achieved through the rapidly increasing number of women students in the universities and schools, which exceed the number of men.”
Progress, he said, will continue to be made but must be done with careful consideration of the difficulties involved.
The official underscored that the UPR is a periodic review that all countries face, and he praised this review process for its focus on not just the problems but also the progress.
“It is essential that we see both the half-empty and half-full characteristics of the glass,” he said. “I would say that the full side is more than half, it’s 70 percent full of positives. The remaining is small particles that can be rectified — even with the society’s help — through the government’s planned development techniques.”
