Munasaha Centres: Indefinite Detention of Prisoners of Conscience in the United Arab Emirates

Munasaha Centres: Indefinite Detention of Prisoners of Conscience in the United Arab Emirates

The UAE authorities have increasingly continued to silence prisoners of conscience through a tactic known as indefinite detention: the failure to free prisoners after their release dates. The use of indefinite detention highlights the UAE authorities’ continuous systemic oppression of political dissent. 

Prisoners are usually placed in ‘Munasaha Centres’, or counselling centres, within the prisons themselves. As defined in Article 1 of the UAE’s counterterrorism law, the centres are aimed at  ‘enlightenment and reform’ of prisoners who are deemed to pose a terrorist threat or those who have been convicted of terrorist acts. Munasaha centres are not separate facilities, but instead part of the prisons in a different ward. As a result, regulation of prisoners’ rights regarding calls and visits apply to prisoners placed in Munasaha centres.

The individuals identified below continue to be arbitrarily held in these centres, either through a court order or through an administrative decision. There are 9 individuals known to be indefinitely detained, two of which are women who have not been transferred to a Munasaha centre but remain in the ward where they served their sentence.

Usually, the public prosecution obtains a court ruling from the Abu Dhabi Federal Appeals Court to place a prisoner in a Munasaha centre for six months, which can be extended infinitely. The court rulings are based on Federal Law No. (7) of 2014 on Combating Terrorism Offences Article 40. In some instances, prisoners are not even brought before a judge and their indefinite detention is an administrative decision. 

When a prisoner is brought before a judge, the typical characteristics of a trial are not present: the hearing occurs over the course of a single day and the prisoner is unable to hire a lawyer. In essence, the public prosecution requires the prisoner to give evidence that he no longer has a ‘terrorist ideology’. 

In the UAE’s federal law, in article 40 (1) of the Counter-Terrorism law stipulates that “a person shall be deemed as posing a terrorist threat if said person adopts extremist or terrorist ideology to the extent that he/she seems likely to commit a terrorist offence”. Article 40 (2) mandates that those seen to pose a terrorist threat shall by court order, upon the request of the state security prosecution, be placed in counselling, or Munasaha, centres, which article 1 defines as “administrative units aimed at enlightenment and reform of persons deemed to pose a terrorist threat or those convicted of terrorist offences”.

Article 48 of the same law allows the public prosecutor to place someone convicted of a terrorist offence in a Munasaha centre, which would be implemented in the same detention centre the prisoner already is serving his sentence in. While in the counselling program, the centre is required to submit periodic reports on the prisoner to the prosecution, of which the prosecution then issues an opinion to the court. This is subject to Article 40(3) of the counterterrorism law, which asserts that the court is able to release the prisoner ‘should it find that his/her conditions so allows’.

The vague nature of the UAE’s anti-terrorism laws and its utility of the counselling centres is profoundly concerning, as expressed by a coalition of UN Special Procedures mandate holders in November 2020. The law fails to clearly define a terrorist threat and sets no time limit for continued detention.  It is unclear if the defendant has any right to attend the court hearing of the prosecution’s report or see or challenge the evidence used to justify his detention.

 

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