UAE: UN experts 'shocked' after rights activists sentenced to life in mass trial
UN experts say they were "shocked" at the life sentences handed down to 43 people, including human rights defenders and activists, by an Abu Dhabi court earlier this month.
The "unfair mass trial" appeared to violate international prohibitions on double jeopardy and called on the UAE to bring its counter-terrorism legislation "fully in line with international law", they said on Tuesday.
“These individuals should never have been detained in the first place for legitimately exercising their fundamental rights and freedoms,” the experts said, calling for their immediate release.
The 43 men, given life sentences on 10 July, were amongst 84 defendants in the second-largest trial in the UAE's history, dubbed the "UAE84".
Most of them were convicted in a mass trial held at the height of the Arab uprisings in 2013 in which people who had petitioned leaders for democratic reforms were accused of plotting to overthrow the govenrment.
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Many had completed their prison sentences but were still being held in controversial rehabilitation centres when they were given new charges last year.
Among the 43 are human rights defender and lawyers Mohammed al-Roken, Mohammed al-Mansoori and Hadef al-Owais who had all completed their original prison sentences but remained detained when they were charged in the UAE84 case.
The experts said the men in the most recent trial were convicted under the country's 2014 Counter-Terrorism Law for acts dating back to the Arab uprisings.
Emirati authorities have maintained the most recent trial was not a retrial and that they had brought a completely different case based on new evidence gathered during a six-month investigation.
But the experts noted that the alleged acts in question in the recent trial took place before the enactment of the 2014 Counter-Terrorism Law.
"Therefore this decision seems to violate international prohibitions on double jeopardy and the non-retroactivity of criminal law," they wrote.
In addition to the 43 life sentences, 10 other people were sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison on charges of “co-operating with al-Islah”, a group the UAE has designated as a terrorist group, and money laundering under the country's counterterrorism legal framework.
The experts warned the UAE to ensure that counterterrorism legislation "does not unnecessarily and disproportionately restrain civil society and civic space".
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