08/12/22 08/12/22 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> my message to the taliban, reopen the school for girls as soon as possible. i urge they keep their word and implore for the international unity to pressure them to reopen the school. amy: as the taliban crackdown on women's rights and lines of afghans go hungry, will look at

life in afghanistan a year after the taliban regained power. we will speak to matthieu aikins about the taliban's dangerous coalition force with the west. in a jury in california is convicted a former worker at twitter of spying for saudi arabia by providing the kingdom private information about saudi dissidents. we will speak to the sister of an imprisoned saudi man who was christened and jailed -- imisoned >> he wasidnaed or thanour yes ago d placed under forced dispearan, utally torted, and stenced to 20 years of imprisonment for tweeting. amy: plus we speak to walden bello come the long come filipino activist and former vice presidential candidate who was arrested monday on cyber libel charges just weeks after the inauguration of the philippines to president ferdinand marcos junior son of the former u.s.-backed dictator.

he says it was masterminded by the news vice president sara duterte. all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. attorney general merrick garland asked a federal judge to unseal the warrant the fbi used in its august 8 search of former president donald trump's estate in florida. garland announced the request thursday as he delivered his first public comments since trump said the fbi had searched his mar-a-lago residence monday. >> the department filed a motion to make public the warrant and receipt in light of the former president public confirmation of the search, the surrounding circumstances, and the substantial public interest in this matter. amy: attorney general garland said he personally approved the warrant and condemned verbal attacks on the fbi and justice

department by trump and his allies. "the washington post" reports the fbi seeking among other things highly classified documents about u.s. nuclear weapons. hours after garland's remarks, donald trump said he encouraged the immediate unsealing of the warrant. if trump is proven to have mishandled classified documents, who could be guilty of a felony. in 2018, and president trump signed a bill upgrading the crime from a misdemeanor to a felony while increasing punishments for those who mishandled classified informatio in ohio, a man wearing body armor and armed with an ar-15-style assault rifle fired a nail gun into an fbi field office in cincinnati on thursday, prompting a gun battle, chase, and armed standoff that ended several hours later when the gunman was shot dead by police in a corn field. officials identified the man as 42-year-old ricky shiffer, a supporter of donald trump and the far-right proud boys

. two days before thursday's attack on the fbi, shiffer posted on trump's truth social online forum, calling on allies to "kill the fbi on sight." shiffer also appears in a video posted to facebook on january 5, 2021, showing him at a pro-trump rally in washington, d.c., the night before the assault on the capitol, and he boasted online that he was at the insurrection. the fbi's execution of a search warrant at mar-a-lago last week has spawned extremely violent rhetoric among trump's supporters. the pro-trump gateway pundit website declared, "this. means. war." a message echoed by trump's former top political adviser, steve bannon, who declared, "the fbi is the gestapo." today is the fifth anniversary of the deadly 2017 unite the right rally in charlottesville, virginia, where self-described neo-nazis landed his car -- slammed his car into protesters,

killing heather heyer and injuring dozens of others. a federal court in washington, d.c., has sentenced former virginia police officer thomas robertson to more than years in seven prison over his role in the january 6 assault on the u.s. capitol. robertson had served as a police officer in rocky mount, virginia. a month prior to the insurrection, robertson called for an open armed rebellion. another former rocky mountain police officer who joined robertson at the insurrection, jacob fracker, is being sentenced today. meanwhile, newly revealed documents show officials at the department of homeland security tried to warn congress last april that text messages sent by secret service agents around the time of the january 6 insurrection were missing, but their attempts were thwarted by the office of dhs inspector general joseph cuffari, a donald trump appointee. the revelation prompted renewed calls for cuffari to resign, and president biden has not ruled out firing him.

the centers for disease control has for the relaxed its guidelines on covid-19. the cdc's new recommendations for their ship the onus to individuals rather than public health measures to reduce the risks of catching the disease. the cdc no longer recommend people remain at least six feet apart, no longer remains -- recommends being quarantined. an epidemiogist ld reporters "we know that covid-19 is here to stay." more than 40,000 people are currently hospitalized with covid-19 across the united states where the disease continues to kill more than 3300 people each week. the international atomic energy agency is calling on russia and ukraine to immediately halt fighting around europe's largest nuclear power plant. on thursday, ukraine reported at least 10 russian shells exploded near the sprawling zaporizhzhia nuclear complex, the latest in a series of attacks that have threatened to trigger a nuclear catastrophe.

in kyiv, ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy said russia had taken the whole world hostage. >> russia has again hit the bottom in the world history of terrorism. no o elshas used a nuclear power plant so obviously to threaten the whole world and to put forward some conditions. amy: earlier today, russia's ambassador to the united nations said he does not support international calls for a demilitarized zone around the zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. elsewhere in ukraine, residents of kharkiv continue to come under heavy shelling, with people reporting missiles struck -- striking a crowded neighborhood thursday. >> there are no military vehicles here. the center of kharkiv. people live here. it is usually very quiet with no military objects nearby. i have no idea why our yard was shelled. amy: meanwhile, russia's foreign ministry has acknowledged for the first time that it's negotiating with the biden

administration for a prisoner swap that could see jailed u.s. citizens brittney griner and paul whelan freed from russian penal colonies. president biden said the news left him hopeful a prisoner swap could be completed. the pentagon says it carried out three airstrikes in somalia tuesday that killed four al-shabaab fighters. it was the second time in recent weeks that u.s. central command announced airstrikes in somalia. elsewhere, five people were killed and a hundred others injured thursday as somali government forces clashed with demonstrators in towns across the breakaway region of somaliland. witnesses said security forces used clubs and live fire to attack protesters who were calling on the somali leader muse bihi abdi not to delay presidential elections in november. this comes as the united nations' high commissioner for refugees said it recently registered the one millionth person displaced by somalia's devastatindrought,hich has led to widespread crop failure and the death of livestock since january 2021. the u.n. says the number of

somalis facing hunger is expected to rise to more than 7 million in the coming months due to the effects of the climate crisis and rising food prices caused by the russian war on ukraine. in southwestern france, more than 10,000 people have been forced to evacuate a massive wildfire that continues to burn out of control near the city of bordeaux. firefighters from austria, greece, germany, poland, and romania have joined some 10,000 french firefighters battling the blaze. this comes as much of europe continues to bake in an unprecedented heat wave. meanwhile, wildfires are raging in central portugal and parts of the united kingdom are again under an extreme heat warning. in brazil, thousands of people took to the streets of cities across the country thursday in defense of democracy after far-right president jair bolsonaro threatened to reject the results of october's first-round presidential election if he loses. former leftist brazilian president luiz inácio lula da

silva, who is running again, currently leads in the polls. bolsonaro has been claiming, without evidence, brazil's electronic voting system is vulnerable to fraud. this is a protester in rio de janeiro. >> we are here to ask for free elections, free education, and improvements for our people. amy: in more news from brazil, police have arrested another five people linked to the june murders of british journalist dom phillips and brazilian indigenous rights advocate bruno pereira. authorities also said one of the other suspects and in the murder as the leader of an illegal fishing organized crime group in the amazon region. phillips and pereira went missing in brazil's javari valley in june. their remains were found dismembered about two weeks later. you can go to democracynow.org to see our interview with indigenous lawyer eliesio marubo in brasília about calls to independently investigate their murders.

and "the san francisco chronicle" reports at least seven employees with the san francisco district attorney's office have resigned since brooke jenkins was appointed da in july. she replaced former progressive da chesa boudin, who was ousted by voters in june in a multimillion-dollar-funded special recall election led by the real estate industry. 15 other staff members were fired following the recall election. jenkins said she volunteered in boudin's recall efforts but now it has received over $100,000 as a consultant for a nonprofit called neighbors for a better san francisco, linked to efforts targeting boudin, who aimed to reform the criminal justice system but faced mountg attacks by the real estate industry. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman.

monday will mark one year since the taliban seized control of afghanistan as the u.s. withdrew troops nearly two decades after the 2001 invasion. afghanistan today is facing what the united nations says is the world's largest humanitarian disaster with more than half of the country's residents facing starvation. meanwhile, the taliban continues to crack down on human rights. it has barred girls from attending high school for the past year. the taliban is also facing accusations of harboring leade of al qaeda. last week, the united states announced it had killed al qaeda leader ayman al-zawahiri in a drone strike in downtown kabul. this all comes as afghanistan is facing dire economic crisis in part because the biden administration has seized $7 billion of afghanistan's foreign reserves held in u.s. banks. we are joined now by the award-winning reporter matthieu aikins, who has reported on

afghanistan since 2008. he was in kabul last year when the city felt to the taliban and he returned to afghanistan in may to report on current conditions. he has just written a piece for "the new york times magazine" titled "the taliban's dangerous collision course with the west." earlier this year, aikins published his first book "the naked don't fear the water: an underground journey with afghan refugees." matt aikins, welcome back to democracy now! why don't you lay out your findings as we mark this first year of afghanistan's fall to the taliban? >> thank you for having me. i went back in order to understand what has happened during the taliban's first year in power. as you recall, the girls school issue is really a litmus test for whether they had changed, whether they would govern differently this time than they did during the first government in the 1990's where they did not allow them to be educated. they did allow girls to go back

to elementary school, university, but had not opened the girls public high schools yet. they had promised to do so, said it was just temporary, and this is going to happen on march 23 -- which was the first day of class for afghan schools. the girls went to school. they were filmed going to classes. then word came out that day, no, the schools would not open. girls were sent home crying. it was an embarrassing debacle for the government. i remember not only being disappointed and heartbroken, but baffled. why would the taliban change their minds at the last minute like this? that is what i went back to find out. in my interviews, meetings with taliban officials in kabul, including the education ministry, what i discovered was many of them had been in favor of reopening the girls school. they thought, something very

much in their interest, not least because the international community was spending billions of dollars to avert humanitarian disaster in afghanistan. so they had prepared plan to reopen schools. but at the last minute, word came from kandahar that schools would not reopen because it turned out it wasn't really up to the officials in kabul. the true power of the movement lies in kandahar with the supreme leader and the leadership council. amy: who really controls what is happening in afghanistan within the taliban? >> it is interesting how mysterious and opaque some of the decision-making is. even some of the senior taliban officials that i spoke to admitted to me in private that they were not fully sure how these decisions were being made or what exactly the role of the supreme leader was. but in essence, to understand how power works with the taliban , you have to look back at the

first government in the 1990's when he had sort of two governments. you had the formal cabinet in kabul and then yet another government led by the then supreme leader who never left kandahar, state in kandahar, governed with a close counsel of other senior taliban leaders, kind of shadow government. that became the leadership of the insurgency for the last 20 years. they went underground in pakistan, and then after the taliban suddenly seized power last summer which is something that surprised even them, that government became grafted onto the current kabul administration. when you have the supreme leader in kandahar, some of the hard-liners in that group who are opposed to reopening girls schools, essentially were able to block what much of the officials in kabul, including some of the deputies like the

defense minister, they were in favor of reopening girls schools but the hard-liners, in essence, block it. amy: talk about afghanistan overall. kabul and the more rural areas and what this divide looks like, how it is playing out and then we will get into this humanitarian crisis in afghanistan of perhaps the worst in the world as so much of the country faces hunger. >> the taliban in the 1990's, they were trying to bring back idea of the virtuous village lifestyle. this is a time of chaos and corruption in the civil war. in these rural ledges, which are very conservative particularly in the south, women don't really leave the house. this is the model they tried to impose across afghan society as a whole in the 1990's with a lot

of repression and brutality. today there is a battle playing out within the movement over whether that vision still holds. the fact of the matter is, even at the taliban have not changed, afghan society has changed dramatically in the last 20 years. millions of girls have been educated. some of the more pragmatic taliban i spoke to in kabul, they understand that reality has changed and they are trying to adapt as well. they see girls can go to school then go to the office as long as they are veiled and separated from men. that is essentially the tension between the city and the countryside playing out within the taliban movement itself. unfortunately for now, we see the hard-liners have won. it is important to remember there is internal dynamics within the movement that hopefully can lead to more reform in the future. amy: according to the united

nations, nearly 1.1 million afghan children under the age of five are expected to experience severe malnutrition in 2022. this is melanie galvin speaking in kabul. >> i think we need in the longer-term we're still going to need greater love funding to just treat these children. in 2023, i will have a gap in supply, for example, if there is not additional resources that come into the country. we have done everything we can with the donations and we are so grateful for them, but this need will continue. it is not going to stop. amy: according to the u.n., half the population faces hunger. talk about the resources the taliban have access to. for example, the u.s. freezing millions of dollars of afghan money and what that means, how

that plays out in afghanistan. >> i think it is important to understand even though the u.s. has spent more than 100 billion dollars on developing aid in afghanistan over the last 20 years, it remains one of the poorest and most aid-dependent countries in the world. that was partly due to the corruption that flourished within the uncontrolled spending by contractors. when that aid was suddenly cut off after the taliban seized power last august, it caused economic collapse, government salaries going unpaid, teachers, medical workers. so the country is now facing a dire economic crisis. it is being kept on humanitarian life-support by a massive -- more aid workers working for the agencies and afghanistan today than there was before the collapse of the government last august and the withdrawal of the u.s. forces. that means the u.s. and its allies are actually funding and

humanitarian efforts are cooperating with the taliban. of course the u.s. did also sees the afghan bank assets that were held in the u.s. and aramark half of that for victims of 9/11 and their families. that puts the u.s. in a funny position because one of the largest funder of humanitarian efforts in afghanistan and one of the main causes of the humanirian crisis with the sanctions. amy: what is the u.s. doing with that money? >> right now it is on ice. there is talk about returning the other $3.5 million to the afghans. they're not 20 give it to taliban but in negotiations to maybe set up a trust fund or something like that. it could be used to recapitalize the financial sector. at one of the big problems facing afghans today, the

economy paralyzed by the sanctions and a lot of -- other banks don't want to do business with afghan banks because their genuine conces, for exale, over trorism a money laundering in essence, the economy can stand on its own feet. it is dependent right now on external aid. the u.n. is flying in palace of $100 bills into kabul, essentially keeping the economy on life support. one of the interesting things i realized after this last year, the collapse of the republic, is in a sense, the crisis and afghanistan has been contained somewhat. massive humanitarian surge, agencies cleaning up after political mess is not just in afghanistan but places like somalia or yemen. it is feeding afghans hand to mouth the migration flows of

refugees to europe have been contained to border walls to have cage afghans is either countries. even despite the massive suffering and afghanistan, i think there's a sense of it is contained in a strange way the taliban has played otello -- stabilizing role in that. sing the taliban just keeping a lid on things. amy: talk about the u.s. drone killing of ayman al-zawahiri. were surprised about this, the killing of the al qaeda leader? the fact he was in a house owned by katana, what that means? >> ice to go jogging basically by that street every morning when i was in kabul. it is right in the middle of the city. it was surprising to see a drone strike there in the house by u.s. aid contractors.

an area occupied by warlords after 2001. this stretches the limit of the containment strategy i just spoke about. the fact is, if afghanistan becomes a threat to its neighbors as it did in the 1990's because of groups like al qaeda, then you could see an intervention on the side of the armed resistance of the taliban that could spark a new cycle of civil war. at the same time, i do think it is important to remember these groups have a long-standing relationship with the taliban. they jointly resisted the u.s. occupation the last 20 years. the taliban are kind of a tricky place where they can't reject these groups but they can't send them elsewhere, obviously. so it is possible by keeping ayman al-zawahiri in kabul, it was a way of keeping him under supervision.

we don't know the details. i was told by u.s. official that according to the information, much of the leadership was unaware ayman al-zawahiri was in kabul and it was the work of affection connected to how connie interior -- haqqani interior ministry. amy: haqqani is the interior induster. >> right come along held as one of the fiercest opponents of the was responsible for many attacks, designated as a terrorist come has a bounty on his head. also happens to be one of the most socially "progressive" of the taliban. he and the group around him who occupy the ministries, some of the most vocal proponents of letting girls go back to school helped out a lot of aid agencies . it just shows the very difficult contradictions that play in the country and i think the need for

understanding better the dynamics. amy: finally, you spent a good amount of time in your piece highlighting maternal health care. the taliban has a contradiction because on the one hand, many in the leadership, a number, don't want girls and women educated, but they only allow women doctors and nurses to deal with women in maternity hospitals. talk about this. >> yeah, so that is the irony. because they only let women deal with women, they need women doctors, women teachers, and there will always be the core of educated afghan women -- even in the 1990's, the taliban allowed female doctors to continue working in some areas. today you have women working -- a lot of women working. that is important to show. i went to this hospital been supported by the red cross, the icrc, and i met women doctors

who were doing heroic, lifesaving work. they are helping women who are coming in now for more distant and rural areas because there is peace and afghanistan, security on the roads. people are coming in where they would have just died at home. these women are working hard. at the fact is, you don't allow girls to go back to high school, then you aren't going to have girls in university of meadow school school and eventually this pipeline of afghan nurses and doctor women docto, is going to run out. that is really ethic the most compelling reason not for international aid or western approval that the taliban should allow girls to go back to school for the own country's interest for the sake of eir own dahters. i think there are some pele in the taliban who derstand tt. they have been blocked by the hardliners. we can only hope, especiay with interl pressurerom any afghans who are speaking up in favor of women's rights, that they wilsee the lit and

allow girls to go back to school. amy: finally, matthieu aikins, 20 years -- more than 20 years after the u.s. invaded afghanistan, they left and left it would you say in worse shape than when the u.s. invaded afghanistan? and how do afghans feel about this? >> i think it is unfair to say it is in worse shape than it was in 2001 when the country was ravaged and impoverished. there has been a lot of gains over the last 20 years. afghans have rebuilt their country. but it came at such a high price in terms of bloodshed and suffering, the damage the war did to the fabric of society, the refugees. so the fact of the matter is, today afghans are in crisis but we don't have the same tools. we are not occupying it more literally. afghan girls are no longer the poster child for the war. there's a limit to what we can

accomplish but i don't think that means our obligation of the country has disappeared. i think we still need to spotlight afghanistan, still need to do all we can to support afghans outside the country and especially inside the country who are still struggling. that includes the girls who want to go to high school. we absolutely need to keep our relationship alive with the country. amy: matthieu aikins is a contributing writer for the new york times magazine, author of "the naked don't fear the water: an underground journey with afghan refugees." we will link to your new article "the taliban's dangerous collision course with the west." coming up, dream california has convicted a former twitter worker is spying for saudi arabia by providing the kingdom private information about saudi dissidents. we will speak with the sister of an imprisoned saudi man who was tortured and jailed for running a satirical twitter account. it was anonymous. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: "afghanistan" by ensemble kaboul. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. a jury in california has convicted a former worker at twitter of spying for saudi arabia by providing the kingdom private information about saudi dissidents. prosecutors accused the man, ahmad abouammo, of taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from a close aide of saudi crown prince mohammed bin salman in exchange for information about 6000 twitter accounts. one of the accounts belonged to saudi aid worker abdulrahman al-sadhan, who ran an anonymous satirical account critical of the saudi kingdom. four years ago, he was abducted by the secret saudi police, tortured, and sentenced to 20 years in prison. the jury's decision comes just weeks after president biden traveled to saudi arabia to meet with saudi crown prince mohammed bin salman. they greeted each other with a

fist bump. we are joined now by abdulrahman al-sadhan's sister areej al-sadhan, as well as jim walden, who is an attorney for the al-sadhan family. areej al-sadhan,et's begin with you. talk about what happened to her brother and how this relates to this jury finding this twitter worker guilty of providing information about twitter users to saudi arabia. >> first of all, thank you so much for having me. when i first heard the verdict, i could not help but thinking about the suffering my brother went through all these years the suffering of my family and the many other families who are a victim of this hacking. four years ago -- more than four years ago my brother was kidnapped from his work at the restaunt in riyadh and disappeared for yearsnd can occasional even access to counsel was deprived.

they broke his hand and fingers most of my brother ended up in the intensive care unit for days promised a week fighting for his life as a result of the torture. only after three years of disappearance and held without any charge, he was brought to a secret trial he got sentenced to 20 years imprisonment followed by 20 years travel ban for writing a satirical twitter account. that account was part of the saudi government's list of twitter accounts they wanted to hack. as we have seen this verdict represents a sp toward accountability. but we want justice. my brother is still disappeared. we have gnocchi medication with him at all. -- we have no communicion with

him at all. he has been held in solitary confinement for years, deprived of any contact of us at all. amy: what kind of recourse do you have right now? have you been in touch with the biden administration, not to mention the leadership at twitter? >> yeah, absolutely. i have been in contact with u.s. officials continuously about my brother's case. the recent visit of president biden to saudi arabia is -- unfortunately, there hasn't been any improvement of human rights. my brother continues to be disappeared. we have not been ab to communicate with himt all. instead from president biden promising to make human rights a center of his foreign-policy, he greeted mbs with a fist bump, essentially validating him on the world stage. committing more human rights abuses against many innocent people.

it is terrifying for us and many other victims out there of this brutal regime. unfortunately, so far have noteard any news or any update about my brother's case, he continues to be disappeared. we have no communication whatsoever with my brother. amy: in a statement, u. attorney for the northern district of california, stephanie hinds, said -- "in this case, the government demonstrated, and the jury found, that abouammo violated a sacred trust to keep private personal information from twitter's customers and sold private customer information to a foreign government. as this case demonstrates, we will not tolerate the misuse of personal information or attempts by foreign governments to recruit secret, malign agents at american technology companies." do you hold out hope that this will be the case? >> i absolutely hold hope, definitely. just to mention, ahmad abouammo

is only the symptom of a much bigger problem. the targeting of activists and anyone who at all is speaking up or doing any human rights activism is very risky from -- the saudi government will target anyone can. i u.s. company here based in the u.s. to target activists in the u.s. and also in other places around the world. they will go to lengths to kidnap and even murder people. ahmad abouammo is only one person but there are many others who are free and we are still targeting people. ahmad abouammo received orders from the right-hand man of mbs, asking him personally to hack these accounts and link their personal information. if that did not happen, my brother would not be in prison

today, virtually disappeared and her private of any communication with us. for me speaking up, i get targeted and harassed continuously online by saudi agents or trying to silence me so i don't speak about the human rights abuses in saudi arabia. amy: jim walden, what responsibility does twitter have in protecting users information about abusive regimes? after reaching the verdict, one juror reportedly told ahmad abouammo's lawyers she wanted twitter to "bear little more responsibility for this." >> first of all, amy, thank you for having me on. twitter and other social media companies have morthan a little responsibility for what is happening, not just with abdulrahman's case and other disappeared saudi activists and

outspoken dissidents, but across much broader array of misconduct. let's be clear, these social media companies have set up trojan horses here on u.s. soil. this is not a bunker outside moscow or similar bunker outside riyadh. this is domains here in the united states being invaded by foul actors for lots of different purposes, whether it is to influence our elections, commit fraud, to enhance transnational repression as was true with respect to abdulrahman , and if social media companies could not put up structures, prevent this kind of action from happening -- not to mention outside their businesses, but insider businesses -- and congress needs to act more robustly to create regulations to require social media

companies to have a meaningful compant system, if you will, internalolice force to guard against this kind of action happening again. amy: speaking to "the new york times in a -- to "the new york times," a twitter spokesperson said the company had cooperated with law enforcement during the trial of ahmad abouammo. twitter security executive seth wilson testified at the trial that abouammo's breach of user'' confidential information had been inappropriate. after the verdict was delivered, wilson tweeted -- "been a long road to get to this conviction. appreciate the efforts of so many to see that justice was done." but how high up was -- i mean, while some try to say this was a low-level twitter employee, it looks like, looking at "the new york times," lawyers for mr. ahmad abouammo described him as

a twitter employee doing his job another media partnership managers at twitter also developed close relationships with influential people who used the platform, provided white glove service come helping them become verified on twitter, handling the complaints about impersonators and troublesome accounts. can you talk more about the responsibility? >> i can. the only thing i agree with them about is the department of justice deserves a lot of credit for aggressively going after this one person. but the question still remains, if he was a low-level person, what the hell is he doing with the personal data of the user? what is a low-level twitter employee allowed to get access to this art of the system that alws them to go beyond and findhe information of the actual person who is using their account, anonymous postings also are permitted, that should be something behind the firewall

that is protected from twitter's employees and only people with certain clearance have access to. twitter clearly d not ve any sort of firewall to prevent that information from getting in the wrong hands, and look what happened. it did. and what did it result in? it resulted in an aid worker who is running an account with satire getting arrested, tortured systematically, deprived of legal counsel, isolated from his family, not subject to a 20 year prison sentence. this is the most un-american activity you could possibly imagine. and for twitter to say it did enough by cooperating after the fact is simply nonsense. they were obligated to cooperate. moreover, it was in their pr to cooperate. if there were good citizens, they would have a structure where the users anonymous information is not generally

available to twitter employees, it is behind protected firewall, and only high-level people with clearance for specific purpose can access that information. amy: areej al-sadhan, can you talk about what you're doing now to have your brother fredia go -- free? is it true they smashed his fingers, broke his hand send this is the hand you tweet with, this is the had you right with? >> yes. the brutality of the saudi officials, just like with their brutal murder of jamal khashoggi, there are thousands more being brutally tortured. unfortunately, my brother was one of them. they broke his hand signed this is the had you tweet with. he almost lost his life as a part of the brutal torture he was going through. on top of that, and left him in solitary confinement for years basically to add to the

psychological torture, depriving him of having any access to legal counsel. i have been speaking as much as ian publicly about the abuses that are happening to us personally to my family, specifically to my brother, into many -- also the other cases i learned about along the journey. the only option was for me to come out and speak out about the abuses. we've been hoping for a year that the saudi government will respond to our request and questions but they have been ignoring us. no help at all. i had no option but to speak out publicly. it was a huge risk because i continued to receive threats to silence me. the one thing i can do or we can do ito keep speaking up and to

ask for action from our u.s. government to take action against these human rights abuses. i have been trying to reach out to the biden administration personally to highlight my brother's case and they are aware of my brother's case among many other cases, especially families whouffer from human rights abuses. so far, we have not seen action from the biden administration. my brother is still disappeared. we need a demand for the saudi government to release my brother and other innocent people who are detained for no reason other than their right to freedom of speech. amy: we want to thank you for being with us and we will continue to follow your brother's case as welas others. areej al-sadhan is the sister of the humanitarian aid worker and online activist abdulrahman al-sadhan. and jim walden is the lawyer for the al-sadhan family. we thank you both so much.

coming up, we speak to walden bello, the longtime filipino activist, former vice presidential candidate. he was arrested in the philippines on monday on siebel -- cyber libel charges will stop stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. we end today's show in the philippines, where we are joined by walden bello, the longtime scholar and activist who ran for vice president of the philippines earlier this year. on monday, walden bello was arrested on cyber libel charges in what was widely viewed as a politically motivated case. walden's arrest comes just weeks after the inauguration of the philippines new president ferdinand marcos jr., the son of the former u.s.-cked filipino dictator ferdinand marcos who

brutally ruled the philippines from 1965 until 1986, when he was overthrown in a popular revolution. the philippines new vice president is sara duterte, the daughter of former president rodrigo duterte. whose so-called war on drugs killed tens of thousands of people. the charges against walden bello stem from comments he made about a member of sara duterte's campaign. on twitter, walden bello wrote -- "these people are mistaken if they think they can silence me and suppress my exercise of free speech." well, walden bello joins us now from manila. welcome back to democracy now! describe what happened to you on monday. >> thank you very much, amy, for invitinge. i think that it is very important to talk about the weaponization of the law in order to intimidate people who

exercise their free speech. i was basically at home on monday afternoon. the police came in and served me the warrant of arrest that have been issued a few hours earlier in the southern city, which may or duterte used to be the head of. it was transmitted here. we've been waiting for the warrant for weeks. but we did not expect it to be within one day that the warrant would be issued several hundred miles away and issued here to me

in manila. so i was brought to the police station. it was too late to post bail. it was said that was deliberate to make me spend a night in jail. the next day, the bail for two counts of cyber libel was posted , nearly coming to about -- slightly under $2000. i was released late afternoon on tuesday. so that is sort of a blow-by-blow account of the 24 hours from my arrest to my

release. amy: can you talk about the cyber libel law that was passed in 2012? >> well, you know, it is a law that is very broad in terms of its application. implications for free speech in this country in the sense that it criminalizes libel so libel is no longer just a civil charge, which can be settled through negotiation and through, you know, cash in order to be settled case. amy: libel, they're using, for

example in your case, you had questioned and televised presidential candidate sara duterte's record as the mayor climbing the city has become the drug smuggling center of the south. so this kind of political criticism they then cast as cyber libel? >> no most of well, let me explain. there were certain remarks that my social media team had posted on facebook. -- posted on facebook that asked mayor duterte if she was aware that her information officer, jefry tupas, was in a party in which drugs were flowing and where people were arrested but he was not arrested.

so it was -- in t context of political debate in which i was raising issues regarding her performance as mayor because that would have an implication for people to assess her record if she was really capable of being vice president. because she and i were running for the same position. so the person that was referred to having been a party, was strictly incidental to the fact it was raised in the context of my questioning her record. not only with respect to that person's presence, but also infrastructure and as you said the reputation of the city for which she was mayor and as a drug center. because of that, they launched this cyber libel case. amy: sara duterte, and other vice president of the philippines, set and a statement

tuesday that she did not play a role in your arrest. she said, i've never filed a libel case in my life. >> nobody believes that. it was very clear that she is the prime motivator of this and i was trying to say that in response to my calling her out fo participating -- that is really what peopleunning for public office do. they not only -- are cap not only push this cyber libel case, the city council declared me persona non grata and i was also labeled by her cap as aarco politician. they don't respond to criticism. instead, they use the law and use instruments of intimidation

in order to silence you. this is exactly what is happening right now. the idea that she is not engaged in this, nobody believes that. the person was her press information officer. because of public criticism, she fired himo there was an element of admission he had done something wrong. en when he became the vice president -- this person is now back as her press person. amy: before we go, i want to make sure you can comment overall on the new government that is headed by the son of the former dictator, headed by marcos jr. and sara duterte, the

son of the previous president. >> yes. let me just say that people are really, really quite worried that this is a foretaste of things to come. just a few weeks after the new government was inaugurated, there is this effort to intimidate the opposition by filing this type of libel case. by the way, my case must be seen in the context of thousands of cyber libel cases. i think the estimate is 4000. that have been launched by politicians against their opponents over the last two years. the most prominent is the way

the brother of duterte had cyber libel cases filed against maria ressa, the head of rappler, who won the nobel prize incidentally. i guess what people are now saying is it has only been a few weeks and they are showing their fax at this point in time. that is true. i think [indiscernible] implications are much larger. i am being made an object lesson of what can happen if somebody dares to criticize a person in high office, somebody in high office in this administration. so i think, amy, this is the reason whyt has sparked so much to mystic outrage as well as international outrage.

people really feel that the weaponization of the law like the cyber libel is something that has become the modus operandi of this cast of government and officials that really do not like criticism. people you talk to throughout the whole range of the society here and throughout the opposition, they have come together on this case because they know if they win this case, if the administration wins this case, it is likely that it will when this case because it has very strong control over the judiciary, then people really

feel democratic rights are in a very grave danger. that is what is at stake here at the moment. and i think people see it, which is why they have come together to demand that the administration, the secretary of justice at this point, just drop this charge against me. amy: walden bello, we will continue to cover your case. walden bello is an acclaimed filipino scholar, activist, and former vice presidential candidate in the philippines. cofounded focus on the global south. arrested monday and charged with cyber libel charges. he was released from police custody on tuesday. that does it for our show. democracy now! is currently accepting applications for a people and culture manager. learn more and apply at democracynow.org. [captioning made possible by democracy now!]