Saudi dissident stabbed in London
Leading Saudi dissident Saad Faqih was attacked and wounded at his home in London late on Sunday by two unknown men, he said.
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| Faqih: The men said it was a message from Saudi government |
Faqih told AFP in a telephone interview from his hospital bed that the men had said it was “a message from the Saudi government”.
Faqih heads the London-based Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia and is a critic of the Saudi royal family.
He was admitted to Saint Mary’s Paddington Hospital with a leg wound which was not life threatening, said a spokesman for Scotland Yard police.
A hospital official also said that Faqih would be able to leave the hospital on Monday.
The dissident said he had been hit with a metal object on the face, the legs and the body.
The attackers were white, spoke English and were “apparently British”, he said.
The men entered Faqih’s home after pretending to be plumbers answering an emergency call, the Saudi dissident said.
Faqih’s group was set up in 1994 and advocates political change in Saudi Arabia through peaceful means.
The group has used fax, internet, radio and a new Islah (or reform) TV channel to promote their ideas and find a way around the official control of information in Saudi Arabia.