Foreign companies operating in Saudi Arabia play a political role that enables them to contribute to political change, especially with regard to democracy and human rights.
Human rights activists express the frustration that they sometimes get because of the slow pace of the means that are used in dealing with human rights, such as the mechanisms of the United Nations and the Human Rights Council, or resorting to other governments and seeking help from them. Activate the role of civil society to make a positive change in this issue.
In Saudi Arabia, foreign investment is an essential part of the 2030 vision, and there is no doubt that the government is striving with all its might to attract the sympathy of these companies to it to ensure more support and legitimacy.
Based on the importance of this role, the actors in the human rights file in Saudi Arabia must focus more efforts on obtaining the interest and advocacy of these companies that will undertake future work, and relying on them to contribute to the demand for change or to initiate it from their position.
Talking about business companies does not only address companies that operate in specific fields such as public relations or consulting, which the government resorts to directly to whitewash and polish its image, but rather goes beyond it to talking about sports institutions and individual companies that are promoted by artists and other public opinion influencers.
The exploitation of various fields of business is not new to the Saudi regime in its attempts to support its narratives and consolidate the image in which it always tries to show itself as an open and modern system, and today it is creating a new model for itself through the major projects it promotes.
For example, the NEOM project, launched by the Crown Prince in Tabuk Governorate in 2017, as part of Vision 2030, aspiring to transform the Kingdom into a leading global model in various aspects of life, is directly responsible for the forced displacement of the tribes living in the area located on the border between Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Not only that, but the residents' objection to leaving the place led to massive campaigns of repression and arrest carried out by the authorities.
The people affected by the displacement process and its consequences, such as the demolition of homes, the confiscation of lands, and the prosecution of those who objected, were able, in cooperation with a number of lawyers, to file a complaint with the United Nations, which included an urgent letter to the Special Rapporteur, and in follow-up to the process of raising the voice, activists and local civil society must communicate with the foreign companies investing in this project, to inform them of the human rights violations committed, as many companies may commit violations without realizing it, despite the fact that the headquarters of these companies are located in countries that promote democratic ideas and that they must abide by legal and human rights legislation, which is what they must It applies to its branches in all regions and countries.
Accordingly, it is incumbent upon human rights organizations to bridge the obvious gap between companies and society, through communication, investigation, data collection and petition signing.
Saudi Arabia's use of side parties and making it a participant in the violations is not new at all, as Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman previously used the rooms of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel to torture many people, most of whom are princes and the ruling family.
Based on the duty to hold companies accountable, 38 human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, called on Google to stop establishing its cloud zone in Saudi Arabia. At the end of 2020, Google signed a contract with Aramco to establish one of the largest cloud computing services in the world.
Many human rights organizations, in addition to Saudi Arabia's record of human rights violations, indicate that the Saudi authorities use companies such as Google, Twitter, and others to spy on their citizens, especially human rights activists.
The Saudi authorities’ use of international foreign companies to carry out their practices does not negate their direct and full responsibility for these violations as the first aggressor and the first beneficiary, but following up the work of these companies and communicating with them contributes to alleviating the severity of the violations by highlighting them and trying to obtain the companies’ advocacy and support, to adopt human rights issues and not be satisfied and being a witness to irregularities and violations.
Finally, we affirm that communication and cooperation between organizations and companies is not easy at all. Organizations incur a lot of trouble in reaching officials in these companies, obtaining their interest, and talking with them. This direct impact on the human rights file, as it is the most system-shaking means, makes this effort worth it.
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*كلمة زينة العيسى في المؤتمر السنوي الثالث لضحايا الانتهاكات في المملكة العربية السعودية الذي عقد بتاريخ 9و 10 ديسمبر 2022.