Dubai Court Shows No Mercy to Tortured Brit
United Arab Emirates authorities have upheld a 21 year old Berkshire student’s 9 year jail term for possessing a single line of cocaine and ‘refused to consider his forced confession and torture as evidence in support of his appeal’, civil liberties charity Reprieve revealed this week.
Ahmad Zeidan was locked up after cops decided 0.04g of cocaine found in the glove compartment of a car he was travelling in with a number on acquaintances belonged to him, prompting them to hood him, batter him and force him to sign a confession in Arabic.
“They kept me in a solitary cell for eight days. For eight days I didn’t know where I was,” Ahmad told the BBC as he was awaiting trial, “They would repeatedly just randomly come in the cell and beat me.”
Speaking this week, Maya Foa, Director of Reprieve’s death penalty team fiercely criticised Dubai’s notoriously punitive justice system.
“Once again, the UAE authorities have dismissed crucial evidence that Ahmad’s imprisonment is based on torture and a false confession, making his conviction entirely unsafe and unsound,” she said.
“Worse still, Ahmed appears to be being penalised for raising these grave violations of his rights. Now more than ever, the UK must do everything it can to ensure Ahmad’s release,” she urged. (http://bit.ly/1vn1VO5 )
