Saudi Arabia pays Guinness World Records in ‘new whitewashing’ ruse – and is awarded records for stunningly boring achievements including ‘largest multi-effect distillation desalination unit’ and ‘largest dental hospital’

Saudi Arabia has won the Guinness World Records for boring achievements, such as having the “largest dental hospital” after paying off the company in a new alleged “laundering” scheme.

This week, GWR announced ten new awards for the country, a decision that has been criticized by human rights groups.

While the records are often interesting and unique, such as the longest beard by a living woman and the most consecutive visits to Disneyland, Saudi Arabia’s achievements are dull in comparison.

Its awards included “largest covered water tank for storing drinking water”, “largest multi-effect distillation desalination unit” and “largest dental hospital”.

Human rights movements view Saudi Arabia as a “repressive” state and the UN has recently expressed concern over the imminent execution of Abdullah Al-Derazi, who was a child at the time of his alleged crimes.

Analysis by Times found that the Middle Eastern country had rapidly increased its number of registrations compared to five years ago.

Before 2019, it received 54 awards, but this number increased to 160 after this period. Last year alone it managed to set 56 niche records, such as “Biggest Intellectual Property Lesson.”

GWR said that of the 223 awards that list Saudi Arabia as the location of the attempt, 88 are standard or vetted requests and 135 were the result of paid consultations.

Human rights organizations claimed that GWR was helping the country hide its reputation.

Zaki Sarraf is a death penalty researcher for Reprieve, a nonprofit that “fights for victims of extreme human rights abuses.”

He called the country a “deeply repressive state” and told the outlet: “The Guinness World Records should not help launder Saudi Arabia’s reputation and cover up what is happening in the kingdom.”

Sarraf added that Saudi Arabia has tried to give itself a better image through a series of public relations exercises, such as the purchase of Newcastle United in 2021.

A £305m deal was agreed with Mike Ashley and the Premier League signed him three years ago.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which owns Newcastle United, will reportedly make a bid for AS Roma for £768m.

James Lynch, co-director of human rights group FairSquare and a former British diplomat based in Qatar, said GWR should announce which of its records were linked to payments.

He also told the newspaper: “Guinness is largely supporting Mohammed bin Salman’s economic and investment drive and when you support that, you are also supporting his broader program of repression.”

Guinness World Records told MailOnline: ‘We really believe that breaking records should be for everyone; Whoever you are, whatever your background, no matter where you are from in the world, we will always take the opportunity to introduce GWR to new audiences everywhere.

‘This inclusive approach carries risks, which is why we follow the lead of the UK and US governments on where we can do business.

“If sanctions are applied, we would of course stop operating within a country, as we did with Russia in February 2022.

‘We would also deny licensing our brand if we felt a record was being used in a polarizing or negative way, and this is something we look for in all applications.

‘GWR is a business and, like so many companies, brands, sporting events, etc. Westerners, as Saudi society has begun to open up, we have seen interest in what we do increase considerably.

‘Fans on our social media channels have increased by the thousands and we are starting to see an increase in requests from the general public, which we service for free, probably driven by many of the records broken by public sector companies and private.

“At events like the Saudi Games, ordinary citizens of Saudi Arabia had the opportunity to experience a record first-hand, for the first time.”