Sheika Latifa is still missing while the UAE authorities stay silent despite the international community calls for answers
Geneva, 15 August 2018
It has now been five-and-half months since Sheika Latifa was last seen alive.
On March 4 2018, Sheika Latifa Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, Princess of Dubai – the 32 years old daughter of the Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum – disappeared aboard an US registered yacht in the international water of the Indian Ocean as she was fleeing by sea her country. Indeed, men armed with gun boarded the vessel – during a raid conducted jointly by the UAE and Indian Coastguard – and abducted Latifa.
The crew were also taken by force, arbitrary detained, subjected to torture and threated of execution by the Indian Coastguard before being held in a secret jail in the UAE. They have been released after several days following the pressure of the irrefutable evidences the international community had about their kidnapping.
On April 18 2018, Agence France Presse revealed that a source close to the government has declared that the Latifa had been “brought back” to the United Arab Emirates. However, the UAE authorities and the Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum have still refused to reveal her whereabouts or any information on her legal status, thus raising fears for his safety.
As a reminder, on February 24 2018, Latifa went to Oman having decided to flee her country with her friend Tina Jauhiainen in order to join Hervé Jaubert, a former French spy, aboard his US registered yacht “Nostromo” who was supposed to conduct them to India and then to US where she intended to claim political asylum.
From her date of departure until the date she was abducted, on 4th March, she was in regular contact with her lawyers and advisors, Ms. Radha Starling and Mr. David Haigh from the NGO “Detained in Dubai” to let them know about her decision to leave the country. Unfortunately, this will be the last time that Latifa will give news.
Before fleeing, she recorded a 39-minutes video, made public on March 11 2018, to be published in case she disappears. She explains that she was about to flee the UAE and the reasons for her decision, accusing her father of having her and her older sister Shamsa, inflicted ill-treatment, even to the point of saying her father “will kill people to protect his own reputation”.
The United Arab Emirates should immediately reveal the whereabouts of Latifa and clarify her legal status. We recall that her disappearance can be qualified as an “enforced disappearance” under the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (ICCPED). With all the information we have we have reason to believe that she is secretly detained, a practice which facilitates the perpetration of torture and can itself constitute a form of-ill treatment.
“It is now 5 months since Radha Starling was witness of the Kidnapping of brave Princess Latifa at sea by India and the UAE, in what was the most harrowing call one can imagine. A young woman seeking her freedom, being taken at gun point against her will, literally been dragged kicking and screaming back to her father” David Haigh said. “The acts of these two countries break some of the most enshrined human rights and shipping laws know to the international community, not least her right to claim political asylum. Whilst the defeating silence of India and the UAE continue, it is now to the international community and the UN that we look to ensure this brave young woman, if alive, is freed and that those responsible are brought to justice”.
Many International organisations and medias are working to urge the UAE to reveal Latifa’s whereabouts. AVT-UAE is concerned about the fate of Latifa and her safety and joins forces to have answers from the UAE and Indian authorities.
