Hillary Clinton not supporting Saudi women

This video, recorded in Saudi Arabia, is called Manal al-Sharif driving video (with English subtitles).

The United States government sees the Saudi Arabian absolute monarchy as a very important ally. Important for the United States Big Oil corporations. And for the United States merchants of death, who are selling so many expensive weapons to the Saudi dictatorship.

By Benjamin Joffe-Walt in the USA:

Saudi Women to Hillary Clinton: “Where are you?”

June 20, 2011

Saudi Women for Driving, a coalition of leading Saudi women’s rights activists, bloggers and academics campaigning for the right to drive, sent the following letter to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday. A similar letter was sent to Clinton’s EU counterpart Catherine Ashton.

Dear Secretary Clinton,

On June 3 we wrote a letter asking you, our friend, to make a public statement supporting our right to drive. More than 20,000 Americans in all 50 states have expressed support for that call.

Many of us have met you personally during your decades-long journey as a champion of women’s rights all over the world, and we expected our call to be met with a warm, supportive response.

Unfortunately, that has not happened, and we write to express our deep concern over the US government’s public silence on the issue of Saudi women’s right to drive.

Three days ago, on June 17, more Saudi women drove a car than ever before. But as we launch the largest women’s rights movement in Saudi history, where are you when we need you most? In the context of the Arab Spring and US commitments to support women’s rights, is this not something the United States’top diplomat would want to publicly support?

We were encouraged to see public statements of support from more than half a dozen Congresswomen, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. But we believe that you personally making a public statement of support for Saudi Arabia opening the country’s roads to women would be a game changing moment.

Women remain barred from driving in Saudi Arabia, one of the strongest and longest standing US allies in the Middle East. This has gone on for way too long and now, this week, we really need you to speak up about it.

God bless you.

Saudi Women for Driving (سعوديات يطالبن بالقيادة)

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Saudi Women for Driving is an informal consortium of Saudi women’s rights activists pulled together after the arrest of Manal al-Sharif, a Saudi mother jailed for driving her car. The group seeks to use online campaigning to build international support for Saudi women’s right to drive. More than 100,000 people in 156 countries have joined Saudi Women for Driving campaigns on Change.org, the world’s fastest-growing platform for social change.

The problem is not just the US government.

It is also British merchants of death BAE selling arms to Saudi Arabia.

And, from British daily The Guardian:

Bahrain protest crackdown defended by European Union envoy

EU foreign policy adviser Robert Cooper downplays violence against pro-democracy protesters saying ‘accidents happen’.

BBC News – Bahrain doctors tortured into confessing, say families: here.

The Independent: Bahraini leadership faces new claims that torture took place in hospital: here.

Bahrain sentences 8 political opponents to life imprisonment: here.

CLINTON FOUNDATION ACCEPTED FOREIGN MONEY WHILE HILLARY WAS SECRETARY OF STATE: Seven foreign governments [including Saudi Arabia] donated during her tenure as Secretary of State, and at least the Algerian government’s donation “violated [the foundation’s] ethics agreement with the Obama administration.” [WaPo]

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• Saudi Women in Drive to get Behind the Wheel (voanews.com)
• Saudi Women Drive in Protest (sparkingtheleft.com)
• Saudi Women Defy Driving Ban (voanews.com)
• Saudi women’s driving protest kicks off with video (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Saudi women prepare for driving protest (telegraph.co.uk)