(CNN) — The White House confirmed, on Wednesday, that it is “closely following” the case of US citizen Saad Ibrahim Al-Madhi, 72, who is imprisoned in Saudi Arabia following he was sentenced to 16 years in prison for tweets criticizing the Saudi government.
White House spokeswoman Karen-Jean-Pierre said at a news conference: “We can confirm Mr. Al-Madhi is being held in Saudi Arabia, and we are following his case closely. We have raised our concerns consistently and extensively regarding this issue at the highest levels of the Saudi government, and we will continue to do so.” .
In response to a question regarding Madi’s son’s statements that his father was tortured and accused the US State Department of mishandling the case, she added: “The Saudi government understands the priority we place on resolving this issue. The exercise of freedom of expression should never be criminalized.”
It is reported that Saad Ibrahim’s son Al-Mady stressed that his father is “not an opponent” and is not close to being so.
“My father is an American citizen who wants to live freely and happily in the United States, where he was educated,” Ibrahim Al-Mady told CNN anchor, Erin Brent.
He added, “The media would have circulated his father’s name much more if he had been arrested in Iran or Russia,” and he continued, “We would have seen his name in the headlines every day,” he said.
“We have consistently and extensively raised our concerns regarding the issue at the highest levels of the Saudi government, both through channels in Riyadh and Washington,” State Department Deputy Spokesperson Vidant Patel said in a briefing on Al-Madi’s case.
Patel also confirmed that there was no official in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the sentencing hearing once morest Saad Al-Madhi, because the Saudi government postponed the date of the hearing without informing the US embassy and never responded to the embassy’s request to attend the hearing weeks before its original date, he said.
He added that the US State Department was still considering whether to classify the past as “unjustly detained”, and added: “The exercise of freedom of expression should never be criminalized.”
Patel also said that the last time the United States was able to gain access to Saad al-Madhi was on August 10, noting that “in many cases, we have difficulties in gaining access to dual nationals detained in Saudi Arabia, but we are doing everything we can to pressure in order to provide assistance as we did in this case as well.”
