Cairo July 16, 2012

ANHRI denounces, the escalation, of the UAE authorities campaign of arbitrary arrest against human rights activists and reformers, and some opponents of the Islamic association “Islah”. It also denounces the authorities exploitation of the official media to  launch a media campaign to discredit opponents and accusing them of being agents of foreign bodies and threatening the security of the state.

Until the noon of Monday, July 16, the authorities arrested six activists, at least, within a few hours, without placing charges against them. That last  attack due to a campaign launched by the activists on the social networking site “Twitter” under the title “their Ramadan with us,” demanding the release of the detainees before the month of Ramadan, which will begin within days.

the last attack was against a number of the religions’ and rights’ advocates and the number of the detainees reached nearly, after three months, about 21 persons, among those who were arrested this morning:

1 – “Abdul Rahman Al-Hadidi,” a director of the Center for the memorization of the holy Quran. He was arrested from Sharjah International Airport as he tried to travel to perform “Umrah”. His wife and 4 of his sons returned after being prevented from traveling as well. His son posted on his own account on “Twitter” that he asked the Security officers for the reason of his father’s arrest, the officers responded after a period of pester that the “Al-Hadidi” knows the reason for the arrest, in reference to his opposition activity.

2 – Dr. “Muhammad al-Mansoori,” Director of the Emirates Center for Studies and Media.
3 – “Hussein al-Najjar,” Administrative coach
4 – Author, “Rashid Al Shamsi,” was arrested from his office in Dubai, have also been prevented from traveling a few days ago.
5 – youth activist “Imran Radwan”, was arrested from his office.
6 -  The family counselor, “Khalid Mohammed al-Shibh Al Nuaimi,.”

The UAE authorities have circulated a statement on Sunday, in which the spokesman for the Attorney General said,  that they have arrested a group of people, did not disclose their names or numbers. Attorney General claimed that they were establishing and managing an organization aims to commit crimes affecting the security of the state, as well as charging them of being affiliate to organizations and foreign agendas.

A lot of followrs believes, that the authorities are trying to launch a false media campaign aims to discredit the political opponents in conjunction with the arrest, to ease the criticism directed to the authorities through the coverage on the real reasons for their arrest, which is; the opposition to the regime and their demands for political reform and social development.

In a related matter, activists asserted to ANHRI, that the UAE authorities deported a human rights activist of the “stateless” “Ahmed Abdel-Khalek”, this morning to Thailand. The UAE authorities have arrested, “Abdul-Khaliq” since 5 months ago, because of his activity of claiming the rights of citizenship of the “stateless” . ANHRI has warned, in a previous release,  of de-citizenship of the activist and deporting him, after being granted citizenship of “Comoros” against his own will.

ANHRI said that “the arrest campaign of several activists without any charges, due to their  participation in the activation of the campaign on “Twitter” under the name “their Ramadan with us”, demanding for the release of the arbitrary detainees in prisons of UAE.

NHRI warned the authorities of place false charges against activists within the policy of maltreatment adopted by the UAE in the recent times, through preventing travel, false charges, deportation outside the country and the withdrawal of the nationality of some of the activists, to eliminate all opposition voices of the regime of the UAE.

ANHRI calls the UAE authorities to immediately release all detainees and stop all other maltreatment methods and to respect its international obligations under human rights conventions.

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