Secrecy and fear permeate every aspect of the state structure in Saudi Arabia. There are no political parties, no elections, no independent legislature, no trades unions, no Bar Association, no independent judiciary, no independent human rights organizations. The government allows no international human rights organizations to carry out research in the country and it ignores requests by such organizations for information. Anyone living in Saudi Arabia who criticizes this system is harshly punished. After arrest, political and religious opponents of the government are detained indefinitely without trial or are imprisoned after grossly unfair trials.
Torture is endemic.
Executions, flogging and amputations are imposed and carried out with disregard for the most basic international fair trial standards. The climate of fear and secrecy makes the monitoring of human rights in Saudi Arabia a difficult task. Amnesty International has persistently asked the government for information and clarification regarding reports of human rights abuses, individual cases, statistics and legislative provisions, and has repeatedly invited the government to engage in a constructive dialogue and to comment on its reports on the human rights situation in Saudi Arabia. It has yet to receive a satisfactory response, and in most cases receives no response at all. Despite this, Amnesty International has over the past 20 years documented patterns of systematic human rights violations by interviewing numerous victims from the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Europe about their experiences of torture and imprisonment in Saudi Arabia.