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Barack Obama under fire for silence on Gulf human rights

US president ignored calls to address violations during visit to Saudi Arabia

US President Barack Obama returned from Saudi Arabia at the weekend under a storm of criticism for failing to mention human rights violations to get the Gulf state on side over foreign policy.

Dozens of US politicians urged Mr Obama to address rights concerns but he failed to bring them up as he tried to convince them to see the US way on Iran and Syria.

Officials insisted that the emphasis did not mean Mr Obama did not share concerns.

“We have a lot of significant concerns about the human rights situation that have been ongoing with respect to women’s rights, religious freedom and free and open dialogue,” a US official said.

But, “given the extent of time that they spent on Iran and Syria, they didn’t get to a number of issues.”

President Obama met women’s rights campaigner Maha al-Muneef before leaving on Saturday morning.

But his main focus on smoothing over the strains in the alliance to the exclusion of concerns over women’s rights drew criticism from many activists.

Saudi campaigner Nasima al-Sada was “disappointment” that President Obama had met only Ms Muneef and not a wider delegation of female activists.

“We were hoping he would meet a delegation of female civil society activists to explain the situation of women and human rights in a better way,” she said.

Ms Sada added that the meeting with Ms Muneef did “not send a real message of support for the rights of women” in Saudi Arabia.

And Amnesty International Saudi researcher Sevag Kechichian said Mr Obama’s visit had offered a “crucial opportunity to raise a series of human rights issues from discrimination against women to the repression of independent human rights activists and freedom of expression and assembly.

“His failure to publicly voice his concerns over the dire state of human rights in Saudi Arabia is disappointing and a real missed opportunity,” she said.

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