Are Arab dissidents facing a new wave of repression?

Ahmed Kamel had been summoned to the Southern Jeddah police state station, but when he arrived on a sultry afternoon last November, no one knew why he was there.

The handsome 34-year-old account manager and father of two had been living in Saudi Arabia for nearly a decade after escaping from his own country, Egypt.

As a university student, Kamel had demonstrated in nonviolent protests during Egypt’s 2011 revolution and again in 2014 when he was shot by riot police, detained and tortured.

He was released on bail a month later and went straight into compulsory military service, leaving with a certificate of good standing. When he finished in 2015, Kamel fled to Saudi Arabia. Two years later, he was given a life sentence in absentia for his role in the protests by an Egyptian court.

And so, here he was in Jeddah, moving from office to office at the old police station on the outskirts of the city, trying to learn why he had been summoned.

Again and again, staff at the station said there was no file on him and, eventually, he was told to go home. But before he could even get there, Kamel was called again and told to return.

Egypt, he was now told, had requested his extradition. On what charges, no one could say, but this time, he would not be allowed to leave. 

“He called me to let me know that he would not be coming home,” his wife, Sherryne Grace Badaoui, told Middle East Eye.

Three months later, Badaoui said, the family is yet to see any official documents related to his arrest. 

She has spent the last few months shuttling between the police station and the prosecutor’s office in Jeddah with their two-year-old and 10-month-old in tow, scrambling to glean scraps of information on her husband’s case.

The Saudi authorities issued an exit visa for him, but without a date. Every day, Badaoui worries that this will be the day he is sent to Egypt.

“Nobody knows what’s going to happen, or at least they’re not telling us what’s going to happen,” she said.

“It’s just really surreal that people can just pluck somebody you love out of your life this way, for no reason at all.”

This is an experience that several families in the Middle East have had in the past three months: Kamel is one of at least four people who were picked up and have faced extradition from one country to another in the region on seemingly politically motivated charges.

On the face of it, the cases are quite different. In addition to Kamel, they include an Egyptian poet celebrating the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad in Syria and a Kuwaiti activist on holiday in Iraq. MEE is not describing the fourth case that it is aware of to protect the safety of the individual involved. 

But their families, friends and lawyers have told MEE of similar bureaucratic nightmares, including struggles to learn basic details about why individuals were being held.

Critically, their cases also all appear to involve a little-known, Arab League-run security body called the Arab Interior Ministers Council (AIMC).

For years, a handful of human rights organisations and UN experts have warned that the AIMC has been used to detain individuals wanted for political purposes, resulting in their extradition to countries where they are at risk of ill-treatment.

Now, with this quick succession of cases since November, human rights experts say the AIMC appears to be becoming a go-to tool for countries to target perceived opponents. 

“We’ve definitely seen more and more cases arising in the Arab League, and it's been mainly extradition requests that are issued by Egypt,” Tanya Boulakovski, human rights officer at MENA Rights Group, told MEE.

“The AIMC has solidified its role in facilitating extraditions recently, it seems like the body that Arab states can resort to to facilitate extraditions between each other without going through Interpol, which would be a bit stricter when it comes to extradition on political grounds.”

Some rights experts attribute the uptick to US President Donald Trump’s re-election, saying that Arab states exploited the gap between administrations to accelerate extraditions. 

Others cite the fall of Bashar al-Assad in Syria as sparking panic in the region and prompting authoritarian governments to clamp down on dissent abroad.

Once in the system, those targeted are at the whim of the local judiciaries, with their fates hinging on the relations between the country where they are held and the country that wants them.

“All Arab peoples are scared. No one is daring to speak up,” said Mohammed Sablouh, the Lebanese lawyer whose client, the Egyptian poet and activist Abdul Rahman Yousef al-Qaradawi, was extradited to the United Arab Emirates last month.

“The AIMC is now used for maliciousness. Anyone who wants to seek revenge on someone will just get a temporary arrest warrant and ruin people’s lives.”

Disappeared after a video

In November, Ahmed Kamel was locked up in Jeddah. A month later, Abdul Rahman Yousef Qaradawi crossed the border from Syria into Lebanon and was arrested.

Like Kamel, Qaradawi was active during the Egyptian revolution. He had helped establish Kefaya, a grassroots movement which predated the uprisings, and he worked on the campaign of Mohammed el-Baradei, who ran in the first presidential elections after Hosni Mubarak’s overthrow.

He is also the son of the late, prominent Islamic scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi who had an intellectual influence on the Muslim Brotherhood which made him - and his family members - a target of the Egyptian government following the overthrow of Mohammed Morsi in 2013.

Qaradawi, 54, had been living in exile in Turkey with his family, including three daughters, and travelled to Syria to celebrate three weeks after the overthrow of Assad. While there, he posted a three-minute video from Damascus on X.

“We pray to God to help the Syrian people and its new leadership to face the evil challenges planned against it by the entire world,” he said as he walked around the Umayyad Mosque where people had gathered to celebrate.

“The main plotters are the regimes of shame in the Arab world and the Arab Zionists, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and others. We say to them: you won't be able to do anything against this flood of change. This flood that began in its second wave on 7 October 2023 out of Gaza.”

Two days later, Qaradawi was behind bars in Lebanon, but the details around his case were murky for his lawyers and his family.

There were two extradition requests for Qaradawi, an Egyptian one and an Emirati one, although it was initially unclear which agency had circulated them.

The Egyptian order, the one under which Qaradawi was arrested initially, was believed to be on the basis of a 2017 conviction issued in absentia by an Egyptian court in a case that rights groups have said was politically motivated.

But two days later, the UAE set a second warrant in motion, solely based on Qaradawi’s video post. What happened next, said Sabblouh, was illegal.

“Lebanese authorities were supposed to apply Egypt’s order,” he said.

“However, due to Emirati pressure and collusion between the UAE and Egypt to allow the UAE to seek its vengeance before sending him to Egypt, the Lebanese judiciary quickly dealt with the Emirati request while ignoring the Egyptian one.”

On 8 January, less than 24 hours after Lebanon’s caretaker cabinet approved Qaradawi’s extradition, a plane owned by RoyalJet, the same Emirati company that rights groups say wrongfully extradited a Bahraini dissident from Serbia in 2022, flew into the airport in Beirut, apparently ahead of schedule, and whisked him away.

It was only when the Emirati state-run news agency reported Qaradawi’s arrival on 10 January that it was clear the warrant for his arrest had been circulated by the AIMC.

Two days later, the same news agency reported that a high-level Emirati delegation had visited Lebanon to make arrangements to reopen its embassy in Beirut which had been shuttered three years.

Until this week, his family had not heard from Qaradawi since he was taken from Lebanon. 

“We do not even know where he is being held,” Qaradawi’s brother, Mohamed Youssef Al-Qaradawi, a professor of mechanical engineering at Qatar University, told MEE earlier this month.

“His lawyer has been repeatedly denied access, and all our requests for him to contact his daughters and family have been ignored.”

The ordeal has devastated the family and created an unbearable emotional toll, made acute by the lack of information about his condition. 

“Abdul Rahman is not just my younger brother. He is a pillar of love and support for all of us," his brother said.

"His daughters have been left without their father, they ask about him every day and we have no answers for them."

On Thursday, Qaradawi's family reported that they received a one-minute phone call from him with unclear audio, asking about his daughters. 

When they asked him why he hadn't been able to communicate with them or his lawyer until now, Qaradawi said he would able to communicate soon with them.

Despite the shortness of the call and the unclear audio, the family said they hope this "is a positive indication of a change in the approach of enforced disappearance" to which Qaradawi has been subjected. 

Handed over at the border

As the year drew to a close, Salman al-Khalidi was atop a hill near the Iraq-Kuwait border. He had a message to deliver.

It was time to liberate Kuwait from the ruling Al-Sabah family and restore his own family’s rule. 

“This is jihad, victory or martyrdom,” he tweeted. “And the promise of God is near.”

Perhaps Kuwait’s highest profile dissident, al-Khalidi, 25, is known among his friends and thousands of online followers for being outspoken - “gung ho,” one supporter said. 

He has also clearly become well known to those whom he is criticising.

In 2022, while he was studying business management at Lusail University in Qatar, Khalidi learned he was set to face trial in Kuwait over tweets he made accusing Saudi Arabia of assassinating journalist Jamal Khashoggi after he had watched the documentary The Dissident.

Khalidi sought asylum in the UK. Soon after arriving, he learned he had been sentenced to five years hard labour over his tweets. 

From the UK, Khalidi continued to make “noise in exile”, as one Gulf human rights activist told MEE. He established the Kuwaiti Refugees Association, which focuses on human rights and politics.

In early 2023, after he was pardoned by the Emir of Kuwait, Khalidi said he had stopped publicly criticising his country in the hope of returning to see his mother. But when he was re-sentenced several months later, he changed tack.

The Kuwaiti Refugees Association’s X account is full of videos documenting Khalidi’s protests against the Kuwaiti government over the past year, including throwing red paint to signify blood at the London home of the former Kuwaiti emir and confronting a former MP during the Kuwaiti Embassy’s cultural week.

When Khalidi told his friend and fellow Kuwaiti exile Mohammed Kallaf that he was planning a trip to Iraq to visit Shia religious sites, Kallaf urged him to be cautious.

“He told me he wanted to send a message that he is not afraid of the Kuwaiti government, and that he travelled to a neighbouring country without fear,” Kallaf told MEE.

“I advised him not to post anything online, but he didn’t listen.”

Preparing to return to the UK, Khalidi was reportedly seized by Iraqi authorities at Baghdad International Airport. 

On 1 January, the Kuwaiti minister of interior announced on X that the Iraqi authorities had handed Khalidi over at the Kuwaiti Al-Abdali border crossing with Iraq. The post was accompanied by a photo of Khalidi slumped on a chair with his eyes closed and his hands behind his back.

A day later, the Iraqi authorities confirmed that Khalidi’s arrest had been based on a warrant circulated by the AIMC.

Khalidi’s friends and online supporters have raised concerns about his wellbeing and treatment after his arrest. 

On 19 January, Kuwait’s Interior Ministry released a video of Khalidi, saying it denied claims that had circulated about him and said he was in good health. 

Kallaf said Khalidi is facing multiple charges which cumulatively carry a sentence of over 40 years. He does not have much hope for his friend’s release. 

“My hope is only in God and the British government, otherwise he will be in jail for decades, just like the thousands that are held there indefinitely,” Kallaf said.

On 4 February, an Instagram post by a Kuwaiti news outlet suggested that Khalidi’s is a “state security” case and reported that his charges had been postponed, pending a review next month after the court appoints a lawyer to represent him.

Confusion and speed 

In interviews with nearly a dozen lawyers, human rights advocates and family members of those arrested on AIMC warrants recently as well as those involved in cases from the past few years, a clear pattern emerges.

There is often initial confusion over which agency has sparked the arrest, with Interpol, the inter-governmental organisation based in Lyon, France, frequently named as the body circulating the warrants. 

In some of the cases, local authorities have stated that warrants were circulated by Interpol, despite the organisation flatly denying involvement. 

In Kamel’s case, the Saudi authorities and the Egyptian embassy continue to insist that his arrest stemmed from a “red alert” issued by Interpol, despite the organisation issuing an official letter to the contrary.

But his wife said Saudi police have refused to accept the letter from Interpol and have also rejected a stay of execution issued by an Egyptian court on 18 November which said Kamel was no longer wanted. 

Interpol and the AIMC have a memorandum of understanding agreed in 2022, but Interpol told MEE that the AIMC cannot request notices or diffusions. 

One reason the confusion may be happening is that some national central bureaus, the offices where Interpol member countries host the agency, have Interpol in their title, even though they are fully staffed and run by national authorities.

The bureaus also often sit within an international cooperation section which may include other agencies like Europol, GCCpol or regional organisations, like the AIMC.

In Arab League countries, this is particularly true, with the same offices frequently responsible for circulating Interpol and AIMC warrants, MENA Rights Group’s Bulakovski told MEE.

So officials not directly involved in international police cooperation may be using Interpol as shorthand to refer to activities directed by another agency, an issue MEE understands that Interpol sees across the region, not just in the Middle East. 

In January, Saudi Arabia and Interpol signed an agreement to create a new Interpol bureau for the region in the kingdom. Interpol has said the new bureau would “work closely with existing national and regional structures, such as the Arab Interiors Ministers Council, GCCPOL and the Naif Arab University for Security Sciences, to strengthen cooperation and information sharing”.

'Misattributed to Interpol'

Asked whether the organisation is doing anything to address the issue of misattribution, a spokesperson for Interpol said: “National central bureaus, and international entities where Interpol has a cooperation agreement, are regularly reminded of their role and responsibilities. 

“In cases of arrests misattributed to Interpol, the countries or organisations involved are contacted directly for clarification.”

Whatever the reason, lawyers say this confusion, paired in many cases with a lack of clarity from officials in the arresting country about their own processes, means it is hard to know how to best protect clients.

“The lack of clarity on the process used makes it difficult for the families and legal representatives to act - to take appropriate steps to try to secure the rights of the detained person, to monitor and report on whether all rights are afforded, and to understand and advise on the process and the best legal response,” said Haydee Dijkstal, who has represented several people affected by the AIMC. 

“There are important implications that impact their rights and their wellbeing by virtue of not being transparent with the process being used.”

This is particularly problematic because, despite the high stakes that extradition presents for those involved, including the risk of disappearance and torture, many of these cases appear to be fast-tracked with local court hearings concluding in weeks or days, like Qaradawi’s. 

Or, as in the case of Khalaf al-Romaithi, hearings are simply bypassed altogether. The Emirati-Turkish businessman was picked up on an AIMC warrant believed to be politically motivated while visiting Jordan in May 2023. 

Before Romaithi returned to court for a scheduled hearing, he disappeared from an Amman prison. His lawyers and family only knew where he was when WAM, the Emirati state news agency, announced that the UAE had “received” Romaithi who was described as a terrorist.

His exact whereabouts remain unknown. The UAE told the UN Working Group on Enforced Disappearances in June 2023 that Romaithi was in a prison in Abu Dhabi, but did not specify which one.

The location of Hassan al-Rabea, a 28-year-old Saudi national who was extradited on what his family and rights advocates say was a politically motivated AIMC-circulated warrant from Morocco in February 2023, is known: he remains in a Saudi prison despite charges against him being dropped.

Sherif Osman, an Egyptian-American activist who had been calling for anti-government protests against Egypt before his arrest in the UAE in 2022, said he didn’t learn for three weeks that he had been detained on an AIMC warrant.

Osman said he was initially brought to an Interpol office situated in a local police headquarters and had his mugshot taken along with nine other defendants who were all wanted by European countries on Interpol warrants. 

Osman said he was assigned a case number - 138/2022 - and that individuals assigned 137 and 139 were wanted by Interpol. 

He said a chief prosecutor he was brought before also told him his arrest had been prompted by an Interpol Red Notice.

When Osman explained he transited through Amsterdam on his way to Dubai without issue, the prosecutor explained that the notice was issued a day after his arrival in the UAE.

But near the end of his over 40-day detention, before the US government helped free him, Osman was told he had in fact been picked up on an AIMC warrant. 

In 2023, Osman filed a lawsuit in a US federal court against Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the AIMC and Interpol for their alleged roles in his detention. 

His lawyers alleged that Interpol and the AIMC had “colluded to shift the purported justification” for his imprisonment from an Interpol red notice to an AIMC one.

The case was dismissed last year after Interpol argued, among several points, that the court did not have jurisdiction over it and that Osman had “failed to state claims” against the organisation.

Osman remains unconvinced that Interpol was not involved and has continued to speak out.

“Why did this start happening after Ahmed al-Raisi came to power?” he said, referring to the current Interpol chief, a former Emirati general who has been accused by two British citizens of overseeing the torture they endured in detention in the UAE.

“Five, six years ago we never saw that confusion,” Osman said. 

The Emirati government has previously defended Raisi, saying that he had a 40-year track record in community and national policing, and would “remain committed to protecting people, making communities safer and providing global law enforcement” as Interpol president. 

When the torture allegations arose during Raisi’s candidacy, Interpol said it was for member countries to ensure they were informed about their candidates “to assess and elect the individual it believes can best meet the responsibilities of the president”.

Asked this month about the number Osman was assigned in prison and whether it resembled an Interpol case number, an Interpol spokesperson told MEE: “There is no indication that a notice or diffusion ever existed for Sherif Osman.”

Lack of oversight

More broadly, there is a sense that the AIMC is a black box of information without any public checks and balances, and one with growing power. 

MEE understands that the council did not respond to UN experts who wrote a letter in 2023, warning that they were concerned that the AIMC was not shielding people wanted over political activities from extradition and asking for clarity on 10 different points related to their concerns.

MENA Rights Group, which has been leading on research and advocacy about the AIMC and was among 15 civil society organisation campaigning this month to draw attention to the body during its annual meeting in Tunisia, has only heard back from the body once in an email acknowledging that the AIMC had received the NGO’s correspondence.

The AIMC did not respond to a request for comment for this article. Nor did the Egyptian, Iraqi or Kuwaiti interior ministries. 

Among those documenting the cases, there is an unsettling pairing of panic and resignation.

Twice in three years, Alexis Thiry, a legal adviser with MENA Rights Group, has watched on flight-tracking websites as planes flew into airports and took away individuals, detained on AIMC warrants, whom he believed were wanted purely for political reasons.

“Sadly, it’s not so uncommon now. We saw it coming since the morning,” he told MEE hours after the plane carrying Qaradawi glided eastwards across his computer screen into the UAE. 

“We knew exactly what was going to happen.” 

Main image created using Chat GPT