Samar Badawi

Editorial update · 13 May 2026 — Badawi was conditionally released on 27 June 2021 after almost three years in prison. She remains subject to an indefinite travel ban arbitrarily imposed in December 2014 in retaliation for her women's-rights advocacy and her family's activism.

Background and Work

Samar Badawi spent over a decade challenging the legal structures that subordinated women in Saudi Arabia. Her work centred on two pillars of the kingdom's gender-based control system: the ban on women driving and the male guardianship regime that required women to obtain permission from a male relative to work, travel, marry, or access healthcare.

When Saudi authorities refused to allow her to register as a candidate in the 2011 municipal elections, she filed a formal complaint with the Grievances Board against the Ministry of Municipal and Rural Affairs. The lawsuit was one of the first to frame women's political exclusion as a justiciable violation rather than a matter of tradition.

She joined the 2011–2012 women's driving campaign, a coordinated effort by Saudi women to defy the driving ban by taking to the roads and documenting their arrests. Badawi not only drove herself but assisted other women drivers with police procedures and court filings after they were detained. Her work earned international recognition: in 2012 the United States Department of State awarded her the International Woman of Courage Award.

Harassment and Travel Ban

Saudi authorities began targeting Badawi in 2014. On 16 September 2014, shortly after she participated in the 27th session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the state imposed a travel ban preventing her from leaving the country. The ban was issued without formal charges and remained in place until her arrest in 2018.

In January 2016 security forces briefly arrested her. In February 2017 she was summoned for interrogation by the Bureau of Investigation in Jeddah. The interrogation focused on her international advocacy and her contacts with foreign human rights organisations. She was released but remained under surveillance.

Arrest and Enforced Disappearance

On 30 July 2018, Saudi security forces arrested Badawi at her home in Jeddah and transferred her to an undisclosed location. For months her family and legal representatives did not know where she was held. The arrest was part of a broader crackdown that began in May 2018 and targeted more than a dozen women's rights defenders, including Loujain al-Hathloul, Nassima al-Sada, and Samar's own sister-in-law, Nouf Abdulaziz.

The wave of arrests coincided with the Saudi government's announcement that it would partially lift the ban on women driving in June 2018. The timing appeared designed to eliminate independent women's rights advocates before the policy change took effect, ensuring that the reform would be credited solely to the crown prince rather than to the women who had risked detention to demand it.

Torture and Interrogation

During her prolonged pre-trial detention, Badawi was subjected to torture and sexual harassment during interrogation. The methods used have not been publicly detailed, but accounts from other women detained in the same period describe beatings, electric shocks, waterboarding, and threats of rape. She was held at Dhahban Prison in Jeddah.

Trial and Sentencing

The first hearing in Badawi's case took place on 27 June 2019, nearly a year after her arrest. She was charged with sharing information related to Saudi women's rights with foreign organisations and officials. The prosecution argued that her engagement with international human rights bodies and foreign diplomats constituted a threat to state security. The maximum sentence for the charges was twenty years.

Her trial was conducted at the Specialized Criminal Court, a tribunal established in 2008 to prosecute terrorism cases but routinely used against peaceful dissidents. The second hearing was held on 20 February 2020. International observers, including diplomats and journalists, were denied permission to attend.

She was sentenced to three years in prison. No public verdict document has been released. The travel ban that had been imposed in 2014 was lifted following her detention.

Release

Samar Badawi was released on 26 June 2021 after serving the full three-year sentence. The Saudi authorities issued no public statement regarding her case. As of her release, many of the women arrested alongside her in 2018 remain imprisoned or under restrictive release conditions, including travel bans and prohibitions on speaking to the media.