In August 2014, a Briton from 74 years old is arrested by Jeddah city police, in Saudi Arabia. In his car would have been found a bottle of artisanal wine. It didn't take more to sentence Karl Andree to one year in Breiman prison in Jeddah.
Today, Karl Andree should be released, but he is kept in prison pending his second sentence. He still has to receive 350 lashes in public…
Karl Andree passed 25 years in Saudi Arabia, where he worked for a local oil company. According to his son, "He was very happy there". His wife Verity lived with him for a long time. But, affected by Alzheimer's disease, she had to return to the UK for treatment. His son on the BBC announces that his father's health is worrying him : "He suffers from severe asthma and has had three cancer operations in the past". There is no doubt, according to his family, that 350 lashes will kill him. To try to save Karl Andree, the family added "We implore David Cameron to personally intervene to help us bring our father home. The Saudi government can only listen to him ”.
Foreign ministry said the embassy in Riyadh supported the detainee and visited Karl Andree regularly to check on his health. "Ministers and senior officials have raised the case of Karl Andree with the Saudi government and we are working to secure his release as soon as possible".
Simultaneously, the British government has announced that it is withdrawing from the tender to modernize the Saudi prison system. Even though British Prime Minister David Cameron assures that there is no connection between the two cases, it is easy to imagine that this withdrawal is actually a retaliatory measure to put pressure on the Kingdom.
Amnesty International said this summer that at least 2 208 people had been executed in Saudi Arabia these 30 last years, of which almost half were foreigners. Last week, European Parliament passed resolution calling on Saudi Arabia to halt execution of Shiite youth Ali al-Nimr, sentenced to death for participating in a demonstration as a minor. A blogger, Raef Badaoui, was also sentenced to ten years in prison and a thousand lashes.
Jean-Nicolas Mouretin
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