Emirati security forces arrested Ahmed Mansour in a late-night home raid on March 20, 2017. In May 2018, the State Security Department of the Abu Dhabi Court of Appeal sentenced Mansoor to ten years in prison on charges entirely related to his human rights activities. On December 31, 2018, the Federal Supreme Court upheld the unjust sentence against him and annulled his last chance for early release. Both trials closed completely, and the government refused requests to publish the indictment and court rulings.
“We regard Mr. Mansoor’s arrest and detention as a direct attack on the legitimate work of human rights defenders in the UAE.”
“According to reports at our disposal, throughout his deprivation of liberty, Mr. Mansour has been kept in solitary confinement, and in conditions of detention that violate basic international human rights standards and which risk taking an irrevocable toll on Mr. Mansoor’s health.” HRW.
In convicting Mansour, the court based its verdict on the UAE’s 2012 Penal Code and Cybercrime Law, both of which criminalize peaceful criticism of senior officials, the judiciary, and public policies, and provide a legal basis for the prosecution and imprisonment of anyone who advocates for political reform.
Mansour’s tweets about injustice, his participation in international human rights conferences online, and his email correspondence and WhatsApp conversations with international human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and the Gulf Center for Human Rights, were included as evidence of criminal activity in support of his fabricated charges.
Since his arrest, Emirati authorities have held Mansoor in a small solitary cell, and he has been denied reading materials, a bed, bedding, and other basic necessities. He is also denied any effective contact with other prisoners or the outside world, including regular visits or calls with his wife and four children, in clear violation of prisoners’ rights under international standards, which the UAE falsely claims to support.
The UAE has arrested and prosecuted hundreds of lawyers, judges, teachers, and activists, and closed major civil society associations and offices of foreign organizations that promote democratic rights, virtually crushing any space for dissent.
Washington Center For Human Rights calls on the UAE to immediately and unconditionally release Mansour along with all human rights activists, political activists and opposition leaders who have been solely imprisoned for practising their basic human rights.
We call on all governments to publicly and privately pressure the UAE to stop human rights violations and release are detainees who have been imprisoned for simply exercising their rights.
We ask governments to stop weapons sales to the UAE given their record of unlawful attacks in countries across the region, including Yemen and Libya.