HOW many Saudi women’s rights activists have to be arrested, detained and possibly face the death penalty before “self-identifying feminist” Theresa May rethinks Britain’s links with Riyadh?

That, according to Saudi Arabia’s Okaz newspaper, is what faces six women and three men who are locked up solely for defending human rights denied to women.

When activists are berated as “traitors,” especially in a medieval dictatorship such as the House of Saud, the consequences are invariably serious.

At a time when the Saudi autocracy is operating an international charm campaign, headed by alleged “reformer” Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Britain’s government is well-placed to raise fears about ongoing repression and denial of any semblance of democracy.

After all, it has licensed £4.6 billion in arms exports to the kingdom in the past three years, including £2.7bn of licences for aircraft and £1.9bn for grenades, bombs and missiles.

That is the period during which Riyadh has headed a coalition of Gulf states to deploy warplanes and other military forces to try to return the discredited Yemeni government to office.

Aerial bombing has devastated civilian areas, supposedly directed at the military bases of Houthi rebels who hold the Yemeni capital Sanaa and much of the country.

The Yemeni people need the war to end and for a negotiated solution providing for a lasting peace to be found.

It is criminal that the Tory government prioritises arms-trafficking companies’ profits and their shareholders’ dividends over the Yemeni people’s right to life and over Saudi women’s campaign for human rights and equality.