Prisoner of conscience and prominent academic Dr Nasser bin Ghaith

• Eminent Emirati academic, economist and human rights defender.
• On 29 March 2017, Dr. Nasser Bin Ghait was sentenced to 10 years of prison. He faced a number of charges relating to his freedom of expression.
• Emirati authorities held Dr. Nasser Bin Ghait in incommunicado detention for 9 months. He was not allowed to see any lawyer or to call his family, nor to access appropriate medical care. 

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Dr Nasser Bin Ghait is an economist, lecturer at the Abu Dhabi branch of the Paris-Sorbonne University.  He was part of the so-called “UAE5”, a group of five activists imprisoned from April to November 2011 on charges of “publicly insulting” UAE officials. They were eventually pardoned and released. His economic commentaries in the Emirati media were often critical of government policy. 

On 18 August 2015, Nasser bin Ghait was forcibly disappeared from his place of work and kept in a secret location for 9 months, where he was subjected to beatings and other ill-treatment. He was denied phone calls to both his lawyer and his family. He was then transferred to a maximum security block in Al Sadr prison. On 18 January 2017, his case was transferred to the Federal Appeal Court. However, the hearing was brief and his requests ignored. On his second hearing, in May 2016, he claimed that he had been tortured. The judge dismissed his claim and refused to order any further independent investigation. Although he is currently suffering from serious medical issues, including high blood pressure, he has been denied appropriate specialised treatment.

On 29 March 2017, Nasser bin Ghait was sentenced to 10 years in prison facing 5 charges related to his rights to freedom of expression and association. He was charged of “posting false information” deemed to “harm the reputation of the state and its institutions”, by claiming that his past trial, that of the UAE5, was unfair and that the defendants had been tortured. At the last hearing, Nasser bin Ghait was not able to present his defence and his lawyer was absent due to last minute changes to the order of the day.  

A coalition of rights groups, including The Gulf Center for Human Rights, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Scholars at Risk and World Organisation Against Torture have all denounced his arbitrary detention and unfair sentence.