‘Farcical mass trial’ sees UAE issue ‘unjust sentences’ against 84 detainees, rights group says

The collective sentences issued against dozens of Emirati dissidents “are politicised, unfair and violate the minimum standards of justice”, the Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK (AOHR UK) said in a statement today.

The sentences were issued during the retrial of activists on charges for which they were tried a decade ago and for which they had received varying sentences, the rights group explained. This “farcical trial”, AOHR UK added, resulted in varying prison sentences and financial fines.

The rulings were based on the same old evidence used in the first case, “without providing any real or substantive evidence, and where witnesses were told what to say,” it explained.

“The retrial sentences reflect the authorities’ persistence in suppressing and terrorising opponents and reveal its complete disregard to national and international laws,” AOHR UK said.

This is the “second-largest mass trial in the country’s history”. A human rights coalition, which includes Human Rights Watch, said the convictions followed a mass trial that was “fundamentally unfair” and called for them to be immediately overturned.

The Emirates Detainees Advocacy Centre said those convicted had already been convicted in 2013 for their involvement with the group, raising concern that the UAE is trying people twice for the same offense, a principle known as double jeopardy.

AOHR UK slammed the “disgraceful international silence” which it says has “encouraged the Emirati authorities to continue violating the rights of detainees.”

Among the detainees in the old and new case are prominent detainees including Abdul Salam Darwish Al Marzouqi and Sultan Bin Kayed Al-Qasimi, who were sentenced to life imprisonment along with the detained academic Nasser Bin Ghaith. The list of those sentenced also included the prominent activist Ahmed Mansoor, whose release the United Nations called for more than once.

The whole list of charges is still unknown, as the authorities restricted access to the case files and did not allow the lawyers to obtain printed or electronic copies of them. According to AOHR, lawyers were also only allowed to view the files on a computer while in the presence of security personnel who prevented them from taking any photos of what they included.

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