PPT has been watching the reports about Hakeem Al-Araibi, a footballer, arrested at Bangkok airport on an Interpol red notice issued at Bahrain’s request. He once played for the Bahrain national football team.
The startling thing about this case is that Al-Araibi has refugee status in Australia, documents for travel and plays for a Melbourne football club.
Hakeem Al-Araibi was arrested at Bangkok airport last week on an Interpol notice issued at Bahrain’s request.
A photo from The Guardian
The 25-year-old told SBS News on Sunday that Thai authorities “discreetly” ordered him to book a flight out of the country.
He booked a flight to Melbourne departing Saturday at 9pm. But three hours before the flight he was told he would not be flying to Australia and was taken to Bangkok’s immigration detention centre.
Al-Araibi’s lawyer, Latifa Al-Haouli, told SBS News that authorities from the Bahraini government and the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs were “pleading their cases” in regard to his detention.
A visa granted by the Australian Government was supposed to allow Mr AlAraibi to remain in Australia indefinitely and to travel to and from Australia without having to travel to Bahrain, the country he has sought protection from.
“Hakeem is a refugee accepted by Australia, so Thailand should do the right thing by sending him back to Australia on the next flight,” Sunai Phasuk, a senior researcher with Human Rights Watch in Thailand, said last week.
“Under no circumstances should Thai immigration authorities hand him over to Bahrain, where he faces 10 years in prison on a politically motivated conviction and a repeat of the torture he experienced before he fled.
Araibi, 25, was sentenced to 10 years in absentia by Bahraini authorities in 2014 for vandalising a police station, a charge he denies.
Two years before that, he was arrested and tortured in detention, allegedly for his brother’s political activities during the 2011 Arab Spring uprising, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported.
In that report, HRW’s Brad Adams is reported:
HRW said Thailand is legally bound to respect the international law principle of “non-refoulement”, which prohibits countries from returning anyone to a country where they may face torture or other human rights violations.
“Handing him [Araibi] over to Bahrain would be a heartless act that blatantly violates Thailand’s obligations to protect refugees and opens Bangkok up to a chorus of international criticism…”.
The reasons for Thailand’s strange actions are: first, Bahrain, like Thailand, is a monarchy, one just a little more absolute than the rest; second, both Bahrain and Thailand are holding rigged elections, and both have been chummy since the 2014 coup; and third, Thailand maintains a fiction of not really recognizing refugees and has a sorry recent history of allowing other repressive regimes to pick up refugees in and from Thailand.
Political Prisoners in Thailand 
[…] from extraditing a former national team footballer to stand trial in Bahrain.” This refers to Hakeem Al-Araibi’s detention in Bangkok. He’s been detained for 13 days now, despite being recognized and registered as a refugee by […]
[…] from extraditing a former national team footballer to stand trial in Bahrain.” This refers to Hakeem Al-Araibi’s detention in Bangkok. He’s been detained for 13 days now, despite being recognized and registered as a refugee by […]
[…] In our first post on Hakeem’s case, PPT noted that the reasons for Thailand’s strange actions on the case are: first, Bahrain, like Thailand, is a monarchy, one just a little more absolute than the rest; second, both Bahrain and Thailand are holding rigged elections, and both have been chummy since the 2014 coup; and third, Thailand maintains a fiction of not really recognizing refugees and has a sorry recent history of allowing other repressive regimes to pick up refugees in and from Thailand. […]
[…] In our first post on Hakeem’s case, PPT noted that the reasons for Thailand’s strange actions on the case are: first, Bahrain, like Thailand, is a monarchy, one just a little more absolute than the rest; second, both Bahrain and Thailand are holding rigged elections, and both have been chummy since the 2014 coup; and third, Thailand maintains a fiction of not really recognizing refugees and has a sorry recent history of allowing other repressive regimes to pick up refugees in and from Thailand. […]
[…] readers may recall that monarchy was mentioned in our first post on al-Araibi’s detention, although there was no information on exactly what was going on at […]