A SAUDI woman imprisoned after a court granted a divorce against her will has appealed to King Abdullah to help reunite her with her husband.
Fatima al-Timani, 34, has been in jail since July with her children, Nuha, two and Sulaiman, who turned one this month. She can go free if she returns to her estranged blood-family, who engineered the annulment last year because they despised her husband, Mansour. But she insisted: "I'm leaving this place [prison] on one condition only: that I go back to my husband.
"I don't want money or anything else. I just want to go back to my husband and live with my children," she said in an interview with Arab News, an English-language daily newspaper.
The case has riveted the usually reserved Saudi media, which has been sympathetic to the couple who married for love over four years ago in a country where most marriages are arranged.
The judge who divorced the couple was recently lampooned on a popular Saudi television show.
The couple had been married for over three years when two of Mrs Timani's half-brothers demanded they divorce on the grounds of "tribal incompatibility" and took the case to court.
They claimed Mansour Timani, 37, lied about his tribal background to enhance his social status. He denies the charge. Mr Timani was allowed to leave prison. He refused at first, but decided he could mount a better appeal on the outside.
The marriage was declared void in July last year, without the couple even being in court. They were arrested by the secret police for living in sin.
The case is now before an appeals court.
_________________________________________________________________
Crossroads Arabia reference:
http://xrdarabia.org/blog/archives/2006/11/22/curious-saudi-court-developments/