Government officials and people close to the detainees said many of those in custody are held without charge, with little or no contact with family members and lawyers, the New York-based daily said on Wednesday.
Many are also being held in maximum-security prisons, and some were even subjected to “rough treatment”, WSJ said.
Among those in detention is a senior royal, Prince Turki bin Abdullah, who served as governor of Riyadh and is a son of the previous monarch, King Abdullah.
Recently, three billionaires from the Mahfouz family, a prominent Saudi banking group, have been detained for unidentified reasons, officials said.
While the spokesperson for the Saudi government did not respond to WSJ’s requests for comment, the kingdom’s deputy attorney general noted some detainees were facing charges that go beyond corruption – such as national security and “terrorism”...