{"id":561,"date":"2021-06-21T14:57:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-21T13:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/?p=561"},"modified":"2021-06-23T14:59:02","modified_gmt":"2021-06-23T13:59:02","slug":"rights-group-urges-uk-to-probe-uae-activists-death-near-london","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/?p=561","title":{"rendered":"Rights group urges UK to probe UAE activist\u2019s death near London"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A US-based advocacy group, Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), has called on United Kingdom authorities to investigate the circumstances of a prominent Emirati dissident\u2019s death in a car crash<\/a> near London.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alaa al-Siddiq, 33, executive director of the UK-based ALQST, a non-profit organisation that advocates greater freedoms and human rights in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the wider Gulf region, died in an automobile collision in Oxfordshire on Saturday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUK police should ensure that no foul play was involved in the death \u2026 in light of the fact that the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain have violently targeted activists in the UK and around the world,\u201d DAWN said in a statement<\/a> on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also urged UAE authorities to arrange for the immediate repatriation of al-Siddiq\u2019s body to the UAE so she can be buried according to Islamic tradition in her hometown surrounded by loved ones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAWN also called on the UAE \u201cto immediately release\u201d Muhammed al-Siddiq, Alaa\u2019s father and a prominent activist, who has been held in detention by Emirati authorities since 2013, so he can attend any funeral held for his daughter in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe very least Emirati authorities could do is to repatriate al-Siddiq\u2019s body and allow her father to leave prison to attend a funeral and properly grieve her loss,\u201d said Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of DAWN and a board member of ALQST, said in the statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLike so many hundreds of thousands [sic] Arab democracy exiles, Alaa al-Siddiq\u2019s exile in the UK was a direct consequence of her government\u2019s repression; her death far away from her loved ones is a tragic and sad outcome of Emirati government persecution.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAWN was founded in 2018 by Jamal Khashoggi<\/a>, a Saudi journalist who was murdered in the embassy of Saudi Arabia in Istanbul, Turkey, later that year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018At risk all the time\u2019<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Also on Sunday, Alaa\u2019s close colleague Khalid Ibrahim, executive director of the Gulf Centre for Human Rights, told<\/a> the UK\u2019s Telegraph newspaper she was \u201cat risk all the time\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe wasn\u2019t afraid and it never stopped her from doing her peaceful and legitimate human rights work, but she knew she was at risk,\u201d Ibrahim said, adding his organisation urged British police to rule out anything untoward in Alaa\u2019s death probe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThose of us who work to expose countries with massive human rights violations are always the target of oppressive governments. We work in a very hostile environment and such governments as those in the Gulf are\u00a0using surveillance technology<\/a>\u00a0to hack into our accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We all know what happened to Jamal Khashoggi.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One human rights activist who worked with al-Siddiq also told the Telegraph that Alaa had \u201cspoken of death threats\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The colleague, who asked to remain anonymous, said: \u201cShe was fighting her whole life for her father and for others.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2021\/6\/21\/rights-group-urges-uk-to-probe-uae-activists-death-near-london<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A US-based advocacy group, Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), has called on United Kingdom authorities to investigate the circumstances of a prominent Emirati dissident\u2019s death in a car crash near London. Alaa al-Siddiq, 33, executive director of the UK-based ALQST, a non-profit organisation that advocates greater freedoms and human rights in the United Arab Emirates […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":562,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-comment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=561"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":563,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/561\/revisions\/563"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.avtuae.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}