Here’s everything you need to know about him.

He was convicted for insulting Islam

The 31-year-old Saudi Arabian writer and creator of secularist website Free Saudi Liberals was originally arrested for insulting Islam and showing disobedience in 2012, and was brought to court for several charges including apostasy. Badawi avoided the death penalty as a high court threw out the apostasy charge in 2013.

Raif Badawi has been sentenced to 1,000 lashes for ‘insulting Islam’ on his liberal website
He has 19 more lashings to endure

Badawi received his first set of lashes after Friday prayers outside the Al-Juffali mosque in Jeddah, which Amnesty International says will continue every Friday for the next 19 weeks. He is due to be given his second set tomorrow evening.

On top of the lashes and a 10-year jail term, Badawi has been ordered to pay a fine of 1million riyals (£175,000).

Badawi’s father reportedly spoke out against him

Part of the punishment, which has been enforced at a time when the debate about Islam and freedom of speech continues to rage, was in part down to « parental disobedience ». It is a crime to disobey your father in Saudi Arabia, and Badawi’s father reportedly went on TV to renounce his son.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Vd3dh9sy2SE#t=0
International pressure is needed, says his wife

His wife, Ensaf Haidar, who Raif married in 2002, has been the victim of anonymous threats. She said: « Two or three days after Raif’s hearing, I started to receive phone calls from unknown people, saying ‘we are going to kill your husband’. But I didn’t respond to them. »

Haidar has claimed political asylum in Montreal, Canada, along with their three children, Terad, Najwa and Miriam, but has been able to speak to her husband while he’s in prison. « Raif told me he is in a lot of pain after his flogging, his health is poor, » she told Amnesty International. « I told our children about the news last week so that they would not find out about it from friends at school. It is a huge shock for them. International pressure is crucial; I believe if we keep up the support it will eventually pay off. »

Saudi Arabia has not listened so far

But international pressure hasn’t had any effect so far. Canada, Germany, Norway and the United States have called for an end to the « brutal » sentence. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the US was « greatly concerned » by reports of the punishment.

Psaki said: « The United States government calls on Saudi authorities to cancel this brutal punishment and to review Badawi’s case and sentence. »

Ensaf Haidar, centre, wife of the Saudi blogger Raif Badawi, holds a vigil in Montreal, Quebec, urging Saudi Arabia to free her husband

Badawi’s writing is incredibly poignant

Until the website was shut down by Saudi Authorities, Free Saudi Liberals was a forum, as well as a place for Badawi to record his musings. In one post, he writes: « You have the right to express and think whatever you want as you have the right to declare what you think about it, it is your right to believe or think, have the right to love and to hate, from your right to be a liberal or Islamist. »

In another post, Badawi used the Israeli occupation of Palestine as a springboard into looking at what he believed was the problematic idea of founding a nation on religion. He wrote: « What we need in the Arab and Islamic societies is more to uphold the value of the individual and uphold freedom and respect for his thinking… States which are based on a religious basis confine their people in the circle of faith and fear. »

The timing of the flogging has linked it to Charlie Hebdo

The timing of the punishments has been criticised. At the Paris rally for the victims of the Charlie Hebdo massacre, one woman held a sign reading: « I am Raif Badawi, the Saudi journalist who was flogged » in an echo of the #JeSuisCharlie slogan.

http://www.independent.co.uk