Sentenced to 45 years in prison in Saudi Arabia for social media posts

A woman in Saudi Arabia was sentenced to 45 years in prison for the content she shared on social media. A social media user named Nura bin Said al-Qahtani was sentenced to 45 years in prison for "using the internet to disrupt the social fabric" and "violating public order through social media".

The Saudi Arabian social media user is said to have criticized the Saudi leader, although it is not known why she was accused. 

Previously, a Saudi Arabian woman was sentenced to 34 years in prison for her posts on Twitter, another social media platform. It was reported that many other female activists in the country were also detained in the past year due to their social media posts.

Abdullah Alaud says he worries that these women could also be given long prison sentences. ALQST, a UK-based advocacy group, also expressed its concerns about al-Qahtani's sentence and said the sentence consisted only of tweets.

"Just as we feared, we are witnessing an alarming decline in human rights in Saudi Arabia," the group said in a statement.

Saudi confirmed the sentence imposed on al-Qahtani on a Twitter account, but there has been no comment yet from Saudi officials.

Previously, another Saudi social media user was sentenced to 34 years in prison

Earlier in August, a Saudi woman named Selma al-Shabaab, a doctoral student at the University of Leeds in England, was sentenced to 34 years in prison. This was the highest punishment ever given to a peaceful dissident.

Al-Shabaab, who came to her country for a holiday from England, was arrested last year on charges of "supplying materials to those who want to disrupt public order" and "publishing false and biased rumors". The 34-year-old mother of two, al-Shabab, had called for reforms in Saudi Arabia and the release of leading activists and intellectuals in prison, before arriving from Britain.