Another problem: Her family wants to kill her for wanting to make her own decisions about marriage and everything else. This is what Saudi Arabia calls "family values".
These stupid fucking assholes who want to kill a young woman are the "moderate Muslims".
Muslims are cowards. They're afraid of women. Muslims are scum. These assholes for Allah need to be wiped off this planet.
 |
| Rahaf Mohammed makes a public statement in Toronto Tuesday. |
Wall Street Journal - Saudi Teen in Canada Protected by Guards Amid Threats
Rahaf Mohammed, who sought asylum, says she wants to lead an independent life.
By Kim Mackrael
Updated Jan. 15, 2019
The young Saudi woman who arrived in Canada last week after pleading for asylum from a Bangkok airport hotel room is being monitored by security guards in Toronto because of threats she has received on social media.
In her first public comments in Toronto Tuesday, Rahaf Mohammed said she wants to live a normal, independent life in Canada and have the freedom to make her own decisions about her education, career and marriage.
“Today I can proudly say that I am capable of making all of those decisions,” the 18-year-old said through a translator. She didn’t take questions from reporters and said she would not be conducting interviews.
Ms. Mohammed used to go by Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun, but a representative for COSTI Immigrant Services, the Canadian organization assisting her with her settlement in Canada, said she has decided to drop her original surname.
Ms. Mohammed arrived in Canada on Saturday after the country’s Liberal government offered her refugee status at the request of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. She will receive government-funded support for roughly a year after her arrival.
COSTI’s executive director, Mario Calla, said the organization would help her find more permanent accommodation, likely with a family, gain access to health care and banking services and learn her way around Toronto. Mr. Calla also said the organization had hired security guards to ensure Ms. Mohammed’s safety after she expressed concern about threats made against her on social media.
“She has taken a position that some take issue with,“ Mr. Calla said. ”I have not seen the threats, but she said yes, she was feeling unsafe and so we have taken those measures.”
Mr. Calla said the organization ensures Ms. Mohammed is never left alone.
Ms. Mohammed drew international attention when she posted on Twitter earlier this month that her passport was seized after she arrived at an airport in Bangkok and she feared for her safety if she was deported. Ms. Mohammed had traveled to Thailand alone, and had planned to continue to Australia, after slipping away from her family during a vacation they were taking in Kuwait.
On Tuesday, Ms. Mohammed said she had not been treated respectfully by her family in Saudi Arabia, but did not provide details. She previously told The Wall Street Journal in an exchange on Twitter that she had once been locked in a room for six months for cutting her hair and feared her family would kill her if she was forced to return to them.
The head of a Saudi government-funded organization, the National Society for Human Rights, issued a statement after Ms. Mohammed’s arrival in Canada that accused some countries of inciting Saudi women to rebel against their family values and seek asylum outside of the country. The statement, which was published on the organization’s website, said some countries and international organizations were acting on political, and not humanitarian, motives. The statement did not name Ms. Mohammed or mention Canada specifically.
Relations between Ottawa and Riyadh have been strained after Canada’s foreign ministry sent a tweet last August calling on the Saudi government to immediately release human-rights activists who had been jailed. That triggered a diplomatic row between the two countries that saw Canada’s ambassador to the kingdom expelled.
Ms. Mohammed said on Tuesday that she considers herself lucky because other women have disappeared while trying to escape their families in Saudi Arabia. Under Saudi Arabia’s male-guardianship system, women must obtain permission from a male relative before they can travel or marry.
“Today and for years to come I will work in support of freedom for women around the world,” Ms. Mohammed said. “The same freedom I experienced on the first day I arrived in Canada.”
—James Hookway contributed to this article.
Write to Kim Mackrael at kim.mackrael@wsj.com
Appeared in the January 16, 2019, print edition as 'Saudi Teen in Canada Is Protected by Guards.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.