There is a protest planned for 10 a.m. July 25, 2002 in front of the Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington, DC, which is at 601 New Hampshire Avenue, NW.
I live a long way from Washington, DC, or I’d show up.
The actual issue that they’ll be protesting is the continued refusal of Saudi Arabian authorities (with collusion from our idiot State Department) to allow an American citizen to leave Saudi Arabia.
Amjad Radwan, 19, was born in the United States — her mother is American, her father Saudi Arabian. The whole family moved back to Saudi Arabia when she was a child. Her mother later divorced Amjad’s father, and tried to regain custody of Amjad, which is just about impossible under Saudi Arabia’s legal system.
But now Amjad is 19, an adult, and an American citizen. She would like to leave Saudi Arabia which is not exactly known for its egalitarian treatment of women. But here’s the problem, under Saudi Arabian law, adult women like Amjad cannot leave the country without permission from either their father or husband.
Amjad’s father so far will not allow her to leave and the idiot U.S. State Department has said that they will respect Saudi law — so even if she should find a way to reach the U.S. embassy and step on American soil, the State Department will do nothing to help this American citizen leave Saudi Arabia.
If the United States wasn’t so blinded by its pro-Saudi Arabian foreign policy, it would simply close its borders to all non-diplomatic Saudi Arabian citizens until Amjad is allowed to leave. But of course our entire Middle Eastern foreign policy is predicated on coddling this corrupt dictatorship.
It’s also surprising that this case has not received more publicity. You’d think that an American woman held against her will by a mysoginistic dictatorship would be a sensationalistic front page story. Maybe this protest will garner more attention for this poor woman’s plight.