Am I too cynical for thinking that some of Abdullah's Western cohorts (Bush et al) probably made some phone calls about how this issue is embarrassing when Saudi Arabia is supposed to be our allies in the War on Terra (one of the supposed reasons for invading Iraq being its human rights violations)?

But as I understand it (via NPR), the Saudi king did it because it was best for public relations, not because he thought the verdict or sentence were wrong. I don't think it's a statement for future judges to not convict rape survivors along with their perpetrators.

"I guess some folks forgot that the criticisms of the sentence hardly came form the West alone."

Either that or some folks assume criticisms of the sentence from *anywhere* must be ultimately Western. From Denmark? Western. From India? Copying the West. From Saudi Arabia? Selling out to the West.

It seems as though even if everyone outside a nation [no matter which nation], and every foreigner in the nation, magically vanished off the face of the Earth one day...the next day reactionaries in the nation would *still* accuse progressives in the nation of sucking up to atheist/colonialist/Hollywood/imperialist/Jewish/secular/Western/etc. outsiders.

Going by what the cop in the background is wearing, I'm quite sure the picture is from India and not Saudi Arabia.

Even if the pardon is a bit patronizing and not an actual statement against the verdict, at least an innocent woman will be free.

I'm glad she's free, but I agree, this is a PR move, nothing more. Saudi Arabia still hasn't changed its rape law that lets this kind of thing happen every day, and their women's rights record is still abysmal. When King Abdullah needs to "pardon" someone for the "crime" of being raped I find it hard to call this a victory. He was pressured on a small, singular case and backed down, but it's not like they're changing to law to make sure this never happens again, or, Allah forbid, let women move around in society without a male escort. Saudi Arabia remains a black hole in global efforts to create equality for women. At least this woman is free, though.

huh.

The male and female victims were in a car together when they were abducted and raped by seven attackers, who were given jail sentences up to nine years.

So it wasn't the guy she was with who raped her. In fact, according to the story, BOTH of them were kidnapped and raped. (They originally had the same sentence, before hers was inflated. So at least there's equity there...talk about a Pyrrhic victory.)
And I'd been thinking the argument was the garden-variety "well, if she's alone with a man, what does she expect?" But the fact that they were together was just incidental. Amazing.
Why don't the rapists get lashes? Not that I believe in this kind of punishment but why reserve the physical punishment for the people who have already been violated?

I'm in the "at least she's free" camp. But you know what bothers me the most about all this? This quote attributed to their Prophet:

"When a woman went out in the time of the Prophet for prayer, a man attacked her and overpowered [raped] her...

He [the Prophet] said to the woman: Go away, for Allah has forgiven you. And about the man who had intercourse with her, he said: Stone him to death. (Sunan Abu Dawud, Book 38, Number 4366)"

So even if she was punished for being alone with a man, the rapists should have been executed under Islamic law.

If they insist on following a legal code that is 1,500 years out of date, the least they could do is GET IT RIGHT.

Broomstick- Yes, the picture is from India, but the article in which it appears quotes several Saudi women protesters.