Hichem Matri, a 32-year old Franco-Tunisia businessman, remains detained in a Saudi prison despite the UN finding his detention arbitrary. Currently on hunger strike in protest of his mistreatment, and having already lost 30 kg, his health hangs in the balance, while his wife was hospitalized today in France due to the physical and mental exhaustion caused by her husband's absence and detention.

Saudi Arabia was again the subject of an Opinion adopted by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on 2 May 2012, this time regarding four individuals detained for years without any trial or legal proceedings against them. In Opinion 8/2012, the Working Group confirms that all four are detained in violation of both Saudi and international law and calls for their release. It also importantly "notes with concern a consistent pattern of arbitrary arrests and detention in Saudi Arabia as well as a silence on the part of the Government by not availing itself of the opportunity to respond to allegations set forth by the source and presented to this group."

On 18 June 2012, the Riyadh Criminal Court brought charges against prominent Human Rights Defender Dr Mohammad Fahad Al Qahtani, co-founder of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association (ACPRA). The eleven charges are clearly all related to his work as a lawyer and human rights defender and he would, if found guilty, risk imprisonment for five years, a travel ban, as well as a heavy fine. Most notably, Dr Al Qahtani stands accused of sending 'false information presented as facts to the official international mechanisms [the mechanisms of the Human Rights Council of the United Nations]'.