30Jun, 2023
    On the 10th anniversary of UAE 94 trial, 51 of 69 detainees served their sentences but remain imprisoned

    On the tenth anniversary of the sentencing of 69 of the UAE94 group, the UAE authorities continue to arbitrarily hold 51 of the 69 individuals after they have finished serving their sentences in UAE prisons, including for over four years.

     UAE authorities justify their ongoing detention by citing the country’s “counterterrorism” law, which allows prisoners to be imprisoned for “counseling” (Munasaha) after they finish serving their sentences. Judges can indefinitely extend these counseling periods. 

    It should be noted that UAE Case 94 is a mass trial conducted by UAE authorities against UAE94 that began in March 2013 and ended on July 2, 2013, when the Abu Dhabi Supreme Federal Court issued verdicts convicting 69 of the 94 defendants, including eight of those tried in absentia, 25 of whom were acquitted. The prison sentences ranged from seven to 15 years.

    Among those convicted were many prominent figures in Emirati society, including human rights lawyer, professor of constitutional law and former president of the UAE Lawyers Association, Dr. Mohammed Al-Roken, and two well-known lawyers and human rights defenders, Dr. Muhammad Al-Mansouri and Salem Al-Shehhi, as well as human rights defenders Abd al-Salam Muhammad Darwish al-Marzouqi and Sheikh Muhammad Abd al-Razzaq al-Siddiq, both of whom were rendered stateless after authorities revoked their citizenship and left them without identity documents.

    26Jun, 2023
    No political prisoners included in Eid Al Adha 2023 pardon

    UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan orders the release of 988 prisoners ahead of Eid Al Adha.

    The President’s annual pardon is a humanitarian gesture granted to prisoners ahead of the holy month of Ramadan, to provide them with the opportunity to start afresh and reintegrate into society. 

    However, dozens of political prisoners, imprisoned for peacefully exercising their right to freedom of expression, have been excluded from the pardon and remain behind bars. 

    The pardon also excluded the 56 prisoners of conscience who are continued to be held in UAE jails without any legal basis after ending their prison sentences.

    They remain held in flagrant violation of national and international laws, in what is called as “indefinite detention”.

    21Jun, 2023
    Cop28: Activists gather outside UAE’s London embassy to protest climate conference

    Human rights activists came together in London on Monday to protest against the decision to hold the Cop28 climate conference in the United Arab Emirates. 

    The event organised by ALQST, which monitors human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab countries, took place outside the UAE’s embassy and was attended by activists from FairSquare, Amnesty International, PEN International and the MENA Solidarity Network.  

    “Having the world climate conference happen in a country that contributes majorly to the climate crisis is just a farce. It renders the event farcical,” Julia Legner, executive director of ALQST, told Middle  East Eye. 

    There are concerns that the petrostate’s own economic interests will inhibit it from making any real progress in the fight against climate change.

    In a speech given at the protest, James Lynch, founding co-director of FairSquare rights group, said: “The UAE autocracy is funded and fuelled by fossil fuels, so there is an inextricable link between fossil fuels and the  autocracy of the UAE. The UAE will fight to keep fossil fuel on the  agenda, to preserve its own power.” 

    In a widely criticised move, Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber, the CEO of the UAE’s national oil company, Adnoc, has been appointed president of this year’s summit. 

    He has been outspoken about the need to phase out emissions from oil and gas production, but has not committed to phasing out the UAE’s production and use – something criticised by Amnesty International. 

    Experts at Climate Action Tracker, an independent scientific project, have concluded that the UAE’s plan for an increase in fossil fuel production and consumption is inconsistent with limiting global heating to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the overarching goal of the 2016 Paris Agreement.

    Monday’s protest not only focused on the UAE’s climate policies, but also its poor human rights record.  

    The event started by marking the two-year anniversary of Alaa al-Siddiq’s death in a road accident. She was ALQST’s former executive director and a prominent Emirati human rights defender. 

    Her father, Mohammed al-Siddiq, remains detained in the UAE despite his prison term having expired in April 2022. He was convicted as part of a 2013 trial dubbed the “UAE 94”, which saw 94 lawmakers, professors, activists and students who had petitioned for democratic reforms tried for plotting to overthrow the government.

    The event then ended with the handing over of a petition to the embassy in support of prisoners of conscience still being held in the UAE.

    Speakers at the protest expressed fears that the UAE’s restrictions on the right to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly will prevent the free participation of civil society in the conference, threatening its success.

    Lynch said this Cop conference comes at “a really pressing moment in the fight against climate change”, and needs to be directed by a presidency that “is trusted, and that is genuine in its intentions to ensure a real dialogue”.

    “But what we have instead is a Cop presidency that has proved itself, as a state, closed off to perspectives that it doesn’t agree with,” he added.

    Lynch told MEE: “Anyone who has tried to dissent has either been put in prison, or forced to go into exile, or has seen what the red lines are and has completely stopped any even mild criticism of the state.”

    Reflecting on Cop27, held last year in Egypt amid a brutal government crackdown on dissent, he added: “The UAE is going to make Egypt look almost pluralistic in the way that the Cop runs.”

    20Jun, 2023
    Ahead of COP28, 40+ NGOs express deep concern over human rights situation in UAE 

    Ahead of the country’s hosting of COP28, more than 40 NGOs have signed a joint statement expressing deep concern over the human rights situation in the UAE.

     Authorities in the UAE continue their sustained assault on human rights and freedoms, including targeting human rights activists, enacting repressive laws, and using the criminal justice system as a tool to eliminate the human rights movement, the statement reads.

    According to the joint statement, these policies have led to the closure of civic space, severe restrictions on freedom of expression, both online and offline, and the criminalization of peaceful dissent.

    The statement called on the UAE authorities for immediately and unconditionally release all those detained solely for the exercise of their human rights.

    It also stressed the need to end all abuse and harassment of detained critics, human rights defenders, political opposition members, and their families;

    It further called for ensuring an ambitious and human rights-consistent outcome of COP28, including through but not limited to the adoption of a call to all states to phase out all fossil fuels and all fossil fuels subsidies to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement.

    Read full statement here: https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/05/01/joint-statement-uae-human-rights-record-ahead-cop28

    7Jun, 2023
    HRW: Climate Talks Should Ensure Fossil Fuel Phaseout

    Governments and advocates attending UN climate talks in Bonn from June 5 to 15, 2023 should push for rights-respecting and ambitious climate action, Human Rights Watch said today.

    To uphold their human rights obligations, governments should commit to a phaseout of all fossil fuels as an overarching agreement of the upcoming COP28 conference. They should assure that the United Arab Emirates, the host, will enable civil society to freely demand climate action before, during, and after the conference.

    “The UAE COP28 host is a petrostate with a deeply repressive government that is aggressively expanding its fossil fuel industry,” said Richard Pearshouse, environment director at Human Rights Watch. “Bonn will be a watershed moment for all governments committed to achieving ambitious climate action to show that they are willing to stand up for phasing out fossil fuels and demanding civil society can meaningfully participate.”

    The Bonn Climate Change conference will lay the groundwork for negotiations at the UN Conference of Parties (COP28) from November 30 to December 12. It increasingly appears that the UAE is seeking to use its position as host to burnish its image while continuing to push the expansion of fossil fuels, undermining efforts to confront the climate crisis and protect human rights, Human Rights Watch said.

    Governments attending the conferences should live up to their human rights obligation to address climate change, including by calling for the equitable and rights-respecting phasing out of all fossil fuels in the COP28 conclusions, Human Rights Watch said. An explicit reference to all fossil fuels in the COP28 outcome document would be an important first in international climate negotiations. 

    5Jun, 2023
    Online petition to free Ahmed Mansoor

    Ahead of the COP28, human rights activists launched an online petition calling for the immediate release of Ahmed Mansoor.

    We are deeply concerned about the continued detention and ill-treatment of human rights activist Ahmed Mansoor, the petition reads.

    Mansoor was arrested on March 20, 2017, and has been held in solitary confinement ever since.

    Mansoor is a prominent human rights defender who has worked tirelessly to promote and protect human rights in the UAE. He has been a vocal critic of the government’s human rights record and has used his platform to call for greater freedoms and democracy in the country.

     We urge the UAE authorities to release him immediately and unconditionally, the petition said.

    The petition also calls on the UAE to respect the rights of all human rights defenders and to ensure that they are able to carry out their work without fear of intimidation, harassment, or arrest.

    2Jun, 2023
    UN calls on UAE to release rights activists jailed past end of sentences

    The United Arab Emirates is arbitrarily detaining 12 human rights activists who have already completed prison terms handed down over an alleged plot to overthrow the government, a U.N. document said on Friday. It called for their immediate release.

    The document was released three weeks after relatives of the prisoners and rights activists said that more than 50 people sentenced for plotting to overthrow the UAE government were being held months and years after their jail terms had ended.

    The dissidents are part of the so-called “UAE94” – a group of 94 lawyers, rights advocates and academics tried in 2013 and whose jail terms in the UAE began expiring in 2019.

    The U.N. document said 12 dissidents whose multi-year sentences had all expired since July 2019 were being held due to their status as human rights defenders and because of their efforts “to hold the authorities to account”.

    The UAE foreign ministry did not respond to Reuters requests for comment. UAE authorities have previously said allegations that prisoners were being held beyond the completion of their sentences were false and unsubstantiated.

    The U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention said the detentions violate several articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

    “The appropriate remedy would be to release all the 12 individuals immediately and accord them an enforceable right to compensation and other reparations, in accordance with international law,” it said.

    The document said the UAE did not respond to the opinion within the 60-day limit.

    A list compiled by the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center (EDAC) 51 people being held beyond their terms in the UAE, which in November will host the COP28 climate conference.

    1Jun, 2023
    Seminar: Rights concerns raised over UAE human rights situation

    In a critical and timely exploration of transnational repression, Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK hosted a compelling webinar titled “Transnational Repression: Endangered Lives of Emirati Dissidents Overseas.” 

    The session was expertly moderated by Emirati Human Rights Activist, Jenan Abdulsalam Almarzooqi, whose personal insights and experience as the daughter of Emirati political detainee, Abdelsalam Darwish, brought a profound perspective to the discussions. 

    The event took a deep dive into the multifaceted challenges faced by Emirati dissidents abroad, with insights delivered by distinguished experts on the subject.

    The panel of speakers for the webinar was a stellar line-up of experts and campaigners in the realm of human rights and international affairs. Haydée Dijkstal, Barrister at 33 Bedford Row Chambers, Bill Law, Editor of Arab Digest and former BBC’s Gulf affairs analyst, Ahmed AlShaibah, Emirati Human Rights Defender, Kristina Stockwood, Campaigner at GCHR, and Sevag Kechichian, Gulf Researcher at Democracy for Arab World Now (DAWN). Their collective expertise brought a depth of understanding to the ongoing issues in the UAE, highlighting the challenges and potential solutions for Emirati dissidents at risk.

    In her speech, Haydée Dijkstal, a Barrister from 33 Bedford Row Chambers, voiced grave concerns over the growing trend. This issue has been most prevalent in cases of dual nationals living in their other country of citizenship. Dijkstal asserts that the UAE is extending its reach into foreign jurisdictions to repress and punish those who exercise their right to free expression by criticising the UAE government.
    In his speech, Bill Law, editor of Arab Digest and former BBC’s Gulf affairs analyst, expressed grave concerns about human rights issues in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, including the United Arab Emirates. He discussed the distressing situation of Emirati dissident, Dr. Khalaf Alrumaithy, who has been missing for three weeks, likening it to similar cases of detained dissidents in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.

    Law believes that the time is pressing for human rights activists to engage with climate change activists to ensure a holistic approach to human rights, encompassing not only the right to clean air and water, but also basic freedoms like the right to free speech and a fair trial.
    In his speech, Emirati human rights defender Ahmed AlShaibah, gave a chilling account of the harsh realities faced by human rights defenders in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). AlShaibah detailed several instances of transnational repression, including the kidnapping of a fellow dissident, highlighting how the UAE authority uses its wealth and power to violate international laws.
    AlShaibah condemned the UAE authority for using what he described as “dirty money” to act against human rights defenders in foreign countries, alluding to cases in Jordan and Indonesia where UAE citizens were allegedly kidnapped with the cooperation of local authorities.

    In her speech, Kristina Stockwood, the Campaigner and Fundraising & Development Manager at Gulf Centre for Human Rights, made some powerful revelations about human rights violations in the United Arab Emirates.

    Stockwood highlighted the disturbing case of UAE detainee Abdulsalam Darwish, expressing deep concern over the persistent threats and intimidation faced by his daughter, who was forced to flee the country in 2016. After the tragic death of another human rights defender, Al Sadiq, the daughter of a detained prisoner of conscience, Darwish’s daughter received further threats online, illustrating the far-reaching influence of Emirati authorities.

    In his speech, a Gulf Researcher at Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), presented a grim forecast for human rights, with an increasing impact on climate justice and rights caused by climate change. He particularly highlighted the rapidly growing influence of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on the global stage, largely fueled by its energy, oil wealth, technological investments, and business interests in the West.