Saudi authorities have released Matrouk al-Faleh, a political scientist and one of Saudi Arabia’s leading human-rights activists, after holding him without charge for nearly eight months, CNN reports.

It remains unclear why Mr. al-Faleh was released or even why the Saudi secret police arrested him in the first place, on May 19 in his office at Riyadh’s King Saud University.

The arrest came shortly after Mr. al-Faleh publicly criticized the harsh and overcrowded conditions that two of his clients were facing in prison. Both men were fellow human-rights activists who had been found guilty of “incitement to protest” after supporting a demonstration outside the prison.

A lot of time on this blog and elsewhere is spent criticizing the leftist-leanings of academia, but I will never argue against the right of professors, even those with whom I disagree vehemently, to voice their own opinions. I will take the inconvenience of a blathering sociology professor over a state-run goon-squad any day.