U.N. rights watchdog raises concerns about Dubai princess
ZURICH - The U.N. human rights watchdog said on Friday it has asked the United Arab Emirates for more information about the status of Dubai’s Sheikha Latifa and proof that she is alive.
The BBC’s investigative news programme Panorama on Tuesday
published a video it said was of Latifa, one of the ruler of Dubai’s daughters,
saying that she was being held against her will in a barricaded villa.
“We raised our concerns about the situation in light of the
disturbing video evidence that emerged this week. We requested more information
and clarification about Sheikha Latifa’s current situation”, Liz Throssell,
spokeswoman for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, told an
online briefing in Geneva.
The OHCHR agency had approached the country’s permanent
mission in Geneva on Thursday, she said.
“Given the serious concerns about Sheikha Latifa, we have
requested that the government’s response comes as a matter of priority....We
did ask for proof of life,” she added, adding the agency would continue to
monitor the situation closely.
The Dubai government’s media office and the UAE Foreign Ministry
did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday.
The Dubai media office earlier this week referred questions
about the video to Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed’s law firm, which has not
responded to a request for comment.
Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed al-Maktoum drew international
attention in 2018 when a human rights group released a video made by her in
which she described an attempt to escape Dubai.
Last March, a London High Court judge said he accepted as
proved a series of allegations made by Sheikh Mohammed’s former wife, Princess
Haya, in a legal battle, including that the sheikh ordered the abduction of
Latifa. The sheikh’s lawyers rejected the allegations.
“I am a hostage and this villa has been converted into a
jail,” Latifa, 35, said in the video published by the BBC on Tuesday.
“All the windows are barred shut, I can’t open any window.”
She said she was making the video in the bathroom of the villa, the only room
she could lock herself into.
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