News - Middle East - Saudi Arabia: A British news and media websitesaid that a bicycle deal from Australia will enhance the sports washing that the Saudi regime is using to wash its heinous crimes.

According to The Guardian, Australian World Tour team GreenEdge Cycling issued a statement announcing a major new sponsor, there was a line that immediately stood out. Brent Copeland, the team’s general manager, was quoted as praising “the mutual respect and alignment of values” between his outfit, currently known as Team BikeExchange, and the sponsor.

In most sponsorship announcements, such sentiment would barely raise an eyebrow – the hyperbole may be forced, but that is the price of deal. Yet on Thursday, Copeland’s comments were conspicuous. His team’s new sponsor is an arm of the Saudi Arabian government, the Royal Commission for AlUla, an ancient city in the country’s north-west and home to a world heritage site.

A previous report revealed that the Saudi regime has spent at least $1.5bn on 'sportswashing'. 

The Guardian said that at home, the Saudi monarchy restricts “almost all political rights and civil liberties”, according to watchdog Freedom House. The Crown Prince “relies on extensive surveillance, the criminalisation of dissent, appeals to sectarianism and ethnicity, and public spending supported by oil revenues to maintain power”. Women face oppressive inequality and were only permitted to drive in 2018. The Saudis are fighting a proxy war in Yemen, which has left thousands of civilians dead and precipitated a humanitarian crisis.

In its latest rankings, Freedom House gave Saudi Arabia an overall score of 7/100 for political rights. That made it the second lowest-ranked country in the Middle East, behind only war-torn Syria, and one of the worst in the world. The Saudis are barely ahead of North Korea (3/100).

“This is really concerning,” says Sophie McNeill, a researcher with Human Rights Watch. “We know that the Saudis like to jump on prestigious international brands to whitewash their image, but this is the last kind of government you want to be associated with. This is a government that is accused of torture, that is accused of war crimes. To be associated with MBS in this way – for fans of cycling, it’s just disappointing.”

Earlier, The Irish Times newspaper said that Saudi Arabia is exploiting the so-called “sportswashing” in order to cover up the Kingdom’s scandalous human rights record.