Saudia Arabian authorities have arrested poet Abdul Mohsen Musalam and fired an editor at a state-run newspaper over a poem that Musalam wrote complaining about judicial corruption in Saudi Arabia.
The BBC presented a partial English prose translation of the poem,
It is sad that in the Muslim world, justice is suffering from a few judges who care for nothing but their bank accounts and their status with the rulers. Your beards are smeared with blood. You indulge a thousand tyrants and only the tyrant do you obey.
Real incendiary stuff there, eh?
Apparently what disturbed the Saudis more than anything was that sales of the newspaper skyrocketed after the poem was published. Wouldn’t want people getting the idea that the Saudi Arabian government is a corrupt monarchy, now would they?
Source:
Saudi author arrested over poem. The BBC, March 20, 2002.