| Followup to yesterday's story... |
The case of a Saudi writer who was sentenced by a Shariah court in Riyadh to 275 lashes and four months imprisonment after being accused of being "corrupt" by members of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, has returned to the Ministry of Culture and Information yesterday after the intervention of the ministry, Arab News has learned.The case is the first of its kind in Saudi Arabia. Dr. Ali Al-Mizeini, an Arabic language professor at King Saud University, was charged by the commission with allegedly questioning the religious institution's abilities and knowledge in an article written by him in Al-Watan newspaper. The commission was represented in court by another professor at the university, Abdullah Al-Barak from the Islamic Culture Department. The accusers demanded that Dr. Al-Mizeini be tried according to Shariah for his writings. Dr. Al-Mizeini was later summoned to a court hearing.
Dr. Al-Barak argued that his suit against Al-Mizeini was a private matter and that he relied on a regulation from the Ministry of Justice dated Oct. 16, 2004, after some persons complained about several articles published in the media. The regulation issued by the minister of justice states that "whatever offends Shariah or Islamic ethics or contradicts anything in the Qur'an or Sunnah (the Prophet's sayings) or is an accusation of a person toward another which demands a religious punishment of lashes or imprisonment according to the nature of the crime is a matter that concerns public courts." The regulation continues: "Public courts or primary courts which are given cases that deal with offenses concerning moral issues or attacks on Shariah that demand religious punishment should not transfer it to other concerned lawful bodies to look into it" Judge Suleiman Al-Fantooh of the Shariah court sentenced him to a four-month jail term and 275 lashes.