In April 2016, Alkarama wrote to the United Nations Working Group on Enforced Disappearances (WGEID) regarding the cases of three Syrian citizens, Qassab Jamal, Mohammad Saleem al Sharqa – who had already been arrested in 2012 for their participation in peaceful demonstrations – and Nassir Al Nuaimi. All three Syrian citizens disappeared after their arrest by the security services between 2012 and 2014.

On 24 April 2016, Issa Al Hamid, president of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association (ACPRA), was sentenced to nine years of imprisonment and a consecutive nine-year travel ban by the Specialised Criminal Court, following an unfair trial during which he was denied access to a lawyer and to the prosecution file, preventing him from preparing his defence. All hearings and sentencing were carried out in private, denying the public access to the trial.

In late March 2016, Yasser Essawy Ahmed Essawy, a sales representative detained since his arrest in October 2013, was urgently hospitalised to receive surgery in a Cairo hospital. Disregarding the doctor’s recommendation, the prison personnel refused the continuation of his hospitalisation after his surgery and sent him back to prison before he had time to properly recover. Even though he was put in the medical section of Tora prison, Yasser Essawy, 41 years old, has been continuously refused medical care since.

On 9 June 2015, Raed Allawi Hussein Al-Janabi, a 35-year-old shepherd was grazing his sheep near Amiriyat Fallujah – 100 km east of Baghdad – when members of the Kata'ib Hezbollah militia in military uniform took him, without presenting a warrant or explaining the reasons.

Alkarama welcomes the release, on 15 March 2016, of Mohamed Al-Ajami, a Qatari poet who had been sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment for writing and reciting, in his home, a poem criticising Arab governments and praising the Tunisian revolution in 2010. Al-Ajami was arrested in 2011 and sentenced in 2013 to 15 years in prison for "inciting to overthrow the regime" and "insulting the Emir".

Ahmad Ali Matar Jaber, 32, is a stateless person, or “bedoon”, who was born in Kuwait. He pursued a career as a linguist and in 2015, received proposals from renowned universities to continue his academic life abroad.

In March 2016, human rights defenders Imad Amara and Faisal Al Tamimi were arrested and tortured due to their work documenting cases of enforced disappearances in Iraq. Both men were volunteers at the human rights NGO Al Wissam Humanitarian Assembly, which documents cases of enforced disappearances and together with Alkarama, submits them to the United Nations Human Rights mechanisms.

In the early morning of 20 February 2016, about 12 members of the Intelligence Services of the Criminal Investigation Directorate in civilian clothes stormed the house of 17-year-old student Fadhel Abbas Ali Hassan Jayed. After searching his room, they arrested him and confiscated his phone. No warrant was shown and they did not provide any explanation for the arrest. Fadhel was then taken to the Criminal Investigation Directorate, where he was tortured with electric shocks, beaten, kicked and slapped on the face and head by masked men.

Egyptian Homeland Security raided Mohamed Mohamed Sadiq Ayyad’s house and arrested him on 13 January 2016. Secretly detained for weeks, he was repeatedly tortured before being charged under various accusations, without the assistance of a lawyer. Still detained to date, he was only allowed to see his relatives for few minutes and his health state continues to deteriorate because he is refused medical care.

As a party to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (UNCAT), Saudi Arabia is reviewed by the United Nations Committee against Torture (CAT), which assesses the country's compliance with its obligations under the UNCAT.