RIYADH (AFP) - A Saudi Islamist academic arrested over remarks condoning suicide bombings was sentenced to five years in prison for "sowing sedition and inciting disobedience to the ruler" his son told AFP.
Saeed bin Zair will appeal against the Riyadh court's verdict, said his the son, Abdullah, who attended the hearing along with a handful of close relatives and a human rights representative.
"The verdict was announced in the absence of a lawyer," who was never appointed, Abdullah said following the two-hour session on Sunday.
After the verdict was read, plainclothed police officers scuffled with members of bin Zair's family who tried to approach the defendant as he was led out of the judge's quarters.
Mufleh al-Qahtani, a representative of the Saudi National Human Rights Association (NHRA) said it had "followed the usual practice".
Commenting on the restrictions concerning public accesss to the trial, Qahtani, who along with another NHRA member was barred from attending a hearing last week, told AFP that judges had the discretion to hold trials in camera.
The interior ministry said in April that bin Zair, who is considered a hardliner and has previously spent eight years in Saudi jail, had been detained because of remarks in which he backed suicide bombings in Riyadh that targeted Muslim and non-Muslim residents.
In an April 15 television appearance, the former professor of mass communications "described the terrorist acts committed by the deviant group as being directed at non-Muslims, while condoning the killing of Muslims (in the process) by those who carry them out", a Saudi official said.
The remarks were made during a debate on Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television.