RIYADH—Saudi Shi'ites held a rare public protest in the southern region of Najran on Tuesday over what they said was repression by hardline Sunni Muslim authorities.
"There are already several hundred people, but more are starting to arrive right now," said one participant called Said, speaking by telephone.
He said dozens of security forces personnel were surrounding the area near Najran airport but there had been no scuffles. Interior Ministry officials could not be reached to comment.
"This is to protest over calling us infidels, seizing our lands, and holding people prisoner for years without verdicts, all because we are Ismaili Muslims," he said.
The Saudi authorities rule via a decades-old alliance with clerics who impose an austere version of Sunni Islam called Wahhabism on the vast, desert country.
Shi'ite minorities in the Eastern Province and Najran in the far south bordering Yemen often complain of marginalisation by the Sunni authorities, who consider them heretics from Islam.
Ismailis, who are a minority branch of Shi'ite Islam, are thought to form a majority in the southwestern city Najran, with a population of around half a million.
At least 77 people were arrested over violent clashes in 2000 after police closed an Ismaili mosque.
A statement sent to Reuters criticised "repressive policies" and said a Wahhabi cleric and judge last month publicly condemned Ismailis as heretics.
"The sheikh said followers of the Ismaili confession were not Muslims in a sermon in front of thousands of Muslims at the Grand Mosque in Mecca," it said.
"If Saudi justice looks at part of society in this, then what can we expect? Years of prison?" said rights activist Ali al-Yami, who authored the statement. "We want a clear position from the government."
He said the local authorities were trying to change the region's demographic balance by giving Saudi nationality to Yemeni tribesmen who are Sunni Muslims.
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