Ghanem Al-Dosari: Saudi Arabia has been spying on me for years, so I raised the matter to the judiciary

A Saudi opposition activist said that he filed a lawsuit in Britain against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for spying on him, making him fear for his personal safety.

In an article published by The Washington Post, human rights activist Ghanem Al-Masarir Al-Dossary confirmed that on January 10 this was granted by the British Supreme Court permission to prosecute Riyadh.

He added that the court informed him that the decision to grant him permission is a rare legal case because it allows a resident of the country to claim compensation for damages resulting from a cyber attack from a foreign country.

Al-Dosari, a satirical actor and commentator famous for his Internet talk show called "Ghanem Show", revealed that London police provided him with a remote alarm button for use in emergencies after he warned him in 2018 that his life was in danger.

Alarm button
Al-Dosari added that the police informed him that he would not hesitate to storm his home once he had received an alarm from him through the button he had provided him, assuming that he was under attack.

He noted that he was cautious whenever he traveled outside Britain for fear of being kidnapped and sent back to Saudi Arabia. He went on to say that Britain granted him asylum on its soil two years ago.

He stated that he knew two years ago that spyware had been installed secretly with his smartphones to feed the Saudi computer server with information, which prompted him to file a lawsuit last November in which he held the Saudi government responsible.

"And when my smartphones started working intermittently two years ago, a friend of mine told me it could be a possible sign of a spyware program installed in them," the Saudi dissident said.

In his article, he indicated that, after examining these phones, the Canadian Citizen Lab of the Internet discovered that it was secretly loaded with a program that allows the monitoring of all its communications and movements. He added that the laboratory tracked the matter and discovered that it was from Saudi Arabia.

Khashoggi
Al-Dosari - who has been criticizing the ruling family in his country, especially King Salman and his Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, through the use of black comedy - said that he did not realize that he might reach this stage when he left his homeland in 2003 when he was 23 years old and he appealed only to freedom .

He explained that he found life in Britain when he reached it, contrary to what he was portraying to them in Saudi Arabia, "a homeland for the infidels, where the people there are no better than animals."

He claimed that the Saudi royal family controls every detail of life, that freedom of expression is not there, and that everyone who expresses a different opinion may be subject to arrest, torture, or even death, as happened to Jamal Khashoggi, a citizen journalist and columnist for The Washington Post who was assassinated by his country's consulate in Istanbul. Year 2018.

The activist indicated that he produces videos in Arabic and broadcasts them through his program "Ghanem Show" on YouTube on the Internet, as he put it, mocking the "corruption" of the Al Saud and their suppression of human rights. He added that the program has been seen more than 300 million times, "which makes me targeted by Saudi Arabia."

Take charge
Al-Dosari accused Al Saud - who claims that its strength is made up of thousands of individuals - that she does not want the state to be run without it, which makes it "completely in control of the matters."

He said he had initially objected to his opposition to the Riyadh regime, but over time he felt the need to speak on behalf of those who were still suffering in Saudi Arabia.

He noted in his article in the American newspaper that Saudi citizens took advantage of social media during the Arab Spring revolution - specifically in 2012 - to demand their rights, noting that he supported that campaign with videos.

According to Al-Dosari, once he launched his channel, "Ghanem Tube", criticizing the Saudi royal family, the YouTube website closed it after receiving a complaint from the Saudis.

Physical assault
He adds that he later produced his program, "Ghanem Show", which was also suspended, but Al-Dosari appealed the decision, and it was returned to broadcast after the YouTube administration conducted an investigation into the complaints.

The Saudi dissident commented with a phrase that is not without ridicule, saying that the more popular his channel, the more inconveniences he faces.

He points out that his website was also hacked after his personal photo was removed to replace the king's image with his crown prince, accompanied by comments "insulting and boasting that the piracy process took only twenty minutes."

Al-Dosari told the story of his physical assault on a London street in 2018 when two people attacked him, warning him not to humiliate Bin Salman. Although he reported the incident to the police, he said, no one was arrested.

He complained that the Saudi regime's spying on him and his private life had a great impact on him personally, which prompted him to file a lawsuit against the government, demanding that he compensate him for the damages he had suffered and to apologize to him.

Al-Dosari ends his article by saying that the violation of his privacy made him fear for his safety, but he stresses that he is more concerned about those who still live in Saudi Arabia and have links with him, and that he fears that their lives are now at risk.