WGAD calls upon UAE to immediately release Nasser Bin Gaith

The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD ) published an Opinion declaring the detention of Emirati activist Nasser Bin Ghaith to be arbitrary, and urging the government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to release him immediately, al-Karama Foundation reported.

 The Opinion was adopted on November 21, 2017 at the 80th session of the WGAD, and made public on February 2, 2018.

Bin Ghaith was arrested in August 2015, and sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment on the basis of a number of charges, some of which were linked to his activity on Twitter. He had previously been prosecuted for peaceful criticism of the government in 2011, when he was arrested along with four other activists after peacefully calling for economic and social reforms. Their case came to be known as the “UAE 5 ”.

The publication of Opinion No.76/2017 comes after the Alkarama Foundation submitted Bin Ghaith’s case to the WGAD on April 10, 2017, having first sent an urgent appeal to the United Nations Working Group on Enforced Disappearances (WGEID ) immediately following his arrest and subsequent disappearance in August 2015.