{"id":4067,"date":"2011-12-01T12:42:10","date_gmt":"2011-12-01T19:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=4067"},"modified":"2011-12-01T12:42:10","modified_gmt":"2011-12-01T19:42:10","slug":"uae-activists-planning-hunger-strike-five-held-since-april-accused-of-%e2%80%98publicly-insulting%e2%80%99-officials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=4067","title":{"rendered":"UAE: Activists Planning Hunger Strike &#8211; Five Held Since April, Accused of \u2018Publicly Insulting\u2019 Officials"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>UAE: Activists Planning Hunger Strike<\/strong><br \/>\nFive Held Since April, Accused of \u2018Publicly Insulting\u2019 Officials<br \/>\nNovember 11, 2011 &#8211; HRW<\/p>\n<p><em>Every month that these men remain locked up on absurd charges of insulting UAE rulers further undermines the government\u2019s claim that this is an open and tolerant country. This trial is all about zero tolerance for political dissent and has nothing to do with justice or security.   Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch<\/em><\/p>\n<p>(Abu Dhabi) \u2013 Five activists jailed seven months ago for \u201cpublicly insulting\u201d United Arab Emirates officials plan to begin a hunger strike on November 13, 2011, Human Rights Watch said today. The activists said the hunger strike will continue until authorities release them unconditionally and end all judicial proceedings against them.<\/p>\n<p>In a joint statement on November 11, they detailed violations of their basic rights by judiciary, prosecution, and prison officials, including their prolonged detention on politically motivated charges and a patently unfair trial. The five said they were \u201ccompelled\u201d to go on a hunger strike after languishing in prison for seven months and having \u201cexhausted all possible means of redress.\u201d International rights groups, including Human Rights Watch, have documented numerous fair trial violations and say that the case against the five is a gross violation of their right to freedom of expression.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEvery month that these men remain locked up on absurd charges of insulting UAE rulers further undermines the government\u2019s claim that this is an open and tolerant country,\u201d said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. \u201cThis trial is all about zero tolerance for political dissent and has nothing to do with justice or security.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The prosecution of the five men violates guarantees of free speech under the UAE\u2019s constitution as well as international human rights law, Human Rights Watch said.  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hrw.org\/news\/2011\/11\/11\/uae-activists-planning-hunger-strike\">&#8230;more<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"igit_tsb_button\" style=\"float: left; margin-right: 10px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.crookedbough.com%2F%3Fp%3D4067&amp;text=UAE%3A+Activists+Planning+Hunger+Strike+-+Five+Held+Since+April%2C+Accused+of+%E2%80%98Publicly+Insulting%E2%80%99+Officials&amp;count=horizontal&amp;via=\" style=\"\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UAE: Activists Planning Hunger Strike Five Held Since April, Accused of \u2018Publicly Insulting\u2019 Officials November 11, 2011 &#8211; HRW Every month that these men remain locked up on absurd charges of insulting UAE rulers further undermines the government\u2019s claim that this is an open and tolerant country. This trial is all about zero tolerance for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=4067#more-'\" class=\"more-link\">more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[247],"tags":[2122],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4067"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4067"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4067\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}