Why is Iran the pariah but not Saudi Arabia?

Saudi Arabia’s record is no better than Iran’s when it comes to respect for human rights. Yet the international community always manages to overlook the Wahhabi monarchy. Could this be connected with Saudi Arabia’s status as top oil-producing country and trusted ally of the United States? Saudi Arabia can intervene in Bahrain, crush democratic protests there, execute 76 people in 2011 (including a woman who was accused of “sorcery”), threaten to execute a blogger who posted an imaginary conversation with the Prophet on Twitter, sentence thieves to amputation, announce that rape, sodomy, adultery, homosexuality, drug trafficking and apostasy are to carry the death penalty -- and nobody except the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights seems to care. The UN Security Council, the G20 (of which Saudi Arabia is a member), the International Monetary Fund, whose director recently visited Riyadh and expressed her appreciation of the kingdom’s “important role” in supporting the global economy: None of them care.

This monarchy still refuses to allow women to travel by car unless accompanied by a husband or a chauffeur, or to participate in the Olympic Games -- and this latest breach of at least two principles of the Olympic charter hasn’t caused much of a fuss. If Iran had been guilty of such sexual apartheid, international protests would have been organised and widely reported. Full story...

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