Raif Badawi

A Wife’s Lonely Fight for Her Husband

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

A review of Ensaf Haidar’s excellent new book about her life with Raif Badawi

* * * *
How does a young mother tell her children that their father—her husband—is in prison for writing what he thinks in a fundamentalist country that oppresses freedom of thought and freedom of expression? How does she tell her children that their father was taken from them because their country punishes thinkers and writers? How does she tell them he was taken from them?

There is no instruction manual for that situation. The moment in which a young mother must live through exactly this moment is only a brief scene in Ensaf Haidar’s newly published memoir of life with and apart from her husband, the writer Raif Badawi, but it is painful to read, because Ensaf (and her co-writer Andrea C. Hoffmann and their skilled translator Shaun Whiteside) bring the reader into the room with her and the children and invite us to feel their terror and confusion.
Read More

‘Secularism is the Solution’: My articles about Raif Badawi

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

This is an up-to-date list of the articles and columns I have written concerning Raif Badawi. Each one was first published here, in The Gad About Town website; several were subsequently linked to and quoted in other media outlets, including the Raif Badawi Foundation’s website itself. (I am not an impartial reporter, so it was an honor to see my work there.)

The ongoing diplomatic silence regarding Raif Badawi is perplexing in the face of the global outcry. Last November, Yves Rossier, Switzerland’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs, told a Swiss newspaper, La Liberté, that Raif Badawi’s sentence has been suspended.
Read More

Inside Raif Badawi’s Prison Cell

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

An Exclusive in The Gad About Town

Raif Badawi is one of Saudi Arabia’s most prominent prisoners—a political prisoner, certainly, a young blogger who was convicted of insulting Islam in his essays on his web site and then flogged as a part of that punishment; but other than a 750-word article that he dictated over the telephone to serve as an introduction to his book, “1000 Lashes: Because I Say What I Think,” he has not been heard from in years. His face is known to millions, and sentences from his eloquent writings are seen on thousands of placards and internet memes celebrating freedom of speech, but he is in danger of being reduced to a symbol.

One of my sources in the “Free Raif Badawi” movement shared with me this weekend a glimpse inside Raif Badawi’s current prison existence. This source requested anonymity but encouraged the writing of this article, and I will reveal neither the name nor even the gender of the source. This individual has indirect contact with Raif Badawi and communicates regularly with two other sources inside the prison complex in which Raif Badawi is now being held. We will not betray any information that can compromise Raif Badawi’s security or condition, so I can not quote Raif Badawi directly. I myself have not had contact with Raif Badawi.
Read More