Human rights endeavors demanding the release of a British prisoner in UAE

Human rights activists have petitioned the United Nations to use their influence to release a former British soldier who has been jailed for seven months in the UAE, for drug trafficking claims, without being formally charged until now.

The Times reported that Detained in Dubai group, based in the UK, commissioned lawyers company to prepare a formal request addressed to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, the team World Organization on Arbitrary Detention, the Special Rapporteur on torture, the UN Rapporteur , Juan Mendez, to pressure the UAE authorities to release the former soldier, Andrew Neal, 44, immediately after the British government ignored the request for assistance.

The activists pointed that there is no evidence to prove the soldier’s guilt, only a written-in-Arabic confession, which the detainee doesn’t speak at all, pointing out that the only witness in the case has retracted his testimony.

The activists asked the United Nations to send human rights experts to the UAE to visit Neal in prison, and to try to drop the charges and release him.

Neal was detained last October by the Dubai authorities for drug trafficking, while he categorically rejected the charge and was later handed over to a heavily guarded prison in Abu Dhabi. Neal served in the British army 24 years and suffers from PTSD, having fought in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Bosnia.

The state security apparatus in the UAE has arrested activists, fabricating security and criminal cases to try detainees after failing to provide any evidence of any alleged “crime.”