Dr.
Mohammed Fahd al-Qahtani
Saudi economist and co-founder of ACPRA, jailed in 2013 on a 10-year sentence. Forcibly disappeared for two years after his term expired in 2022 and finally conditionally released in January 2025, subject to a 10-year travel ban.
- Country
- Saudi Arabia
- Role
- Academic / researcher
- Arrested
- 24 Oct 2022
- Sentence
- 10 years imprisonment + 10-year travel ban (March 2013). Held an additional two years past sentence expiry through enforced disappearance.
- Status
- At liberty
- Arrested
- 24 Oct 2022
- Sentence
- 10 years imprisonment + 10-year travel ban (March 2013). Held an additional two years past sentence expiry through enforced disappearance.
- Judicial status
- Convicted, not final
- Name in Arabic
- محمد فهد القحطاني
- Charges
- Turning public opinion against the authorities; founding an unlicensed organisation (ACPRA); breaking allegiance to the ruler; insulting the judiciary; spreading chaos (tried under the Anti-Cybercrime Law and pre-2017 royal decrees).
The arrest, and what followed.
Background and work
Dr. Mohammed Fahd al-Qahtani is a Saudi economist trained in the United States and a co-founder of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association (ACPRA), one of the kingdom's first independent human rights organisations. ACPRA built a public archive of arbitrary detention cases, advocated for constitutional reform, and pressed for the rights of political prisoners and their families through plain-language reports, press interviews and direct petitions to the royal court.
Arrest and detention
After years of intermittent harassment, he was placed on trial, while still free, in 2012 alongside fellow ACPRA co-founder Abdullah al-Hamid. In March 2013 a court in Riyadh sentenced him to ten years in prison followed by a ten-year travel ban. The charges centred on the founding and work of ACPRA itself: turning public opinion against the authorities, founding an unlicensed organisation, and breaking allegiance to the ruler.
Conviction and imprisonment
He served his sentence at al-Ha'ir prison south of Riyadh. ACPRA was forcibly dissolved during his trial; every one of its co-founders was either imprisoned or forced into exile. His original term expired on 22 November 2022, but he was not released. Instead, the authorities placed him in incommunicado detention and refused to acknowledge his whereabouts. His family in the United States went two years without confirmation that he was alive.
Current status as of 2026
On 7 January 2025, after nearly twelve years in custody, he was conditionally released. The conditions include a ten-year travel ban that prevents him from rejoining his wife Maha al-Qahtani and their five children, all of whom live in the United States. He has not resumed any public human rights work; ACPRA itself remains banned.