ABU DHABI: The United Arab Emirates is to try a British PhD student detained in May on charges of spying, local media reported Monday.
Matthew Hedges, a 31-year-old who was researching the UAE’s foreign and internal security policies after the 2011 Arab Spring revolutions, was detained at Dubai airport on May 5.
He is to stand trial in the Emirati capital of Abu Dhabi “on charges of spying for a foreign country, jeopardizing the military, political and economic security of the state,” attorney general Hamad Al-Shamsi said, quoted by local media.
Shamsi, without giving a trial date, said the charges were “based on legal evidence and findings from investigations that were carried out by the public prosecution.”
Hedges had been posing as a researcher to cover his activities, he said, adding that the accusations were backed by “information taken from his electronic devices.”
British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt told AFP last week that he was “very worried” about Hedges’ fate.
The detainee’s wife Daniela Tejada, who has visited him once and spoken to him on the phone several times, said he was expected to appear in court on October 24.
Her husband, held in solitary confinement, was “a man of integrity and principle. He has a brilliant academic mind... He is kind and caring and greatly loved and respected. Please send him home.”
Tejada said last week that his research involved only open resources.
“He’s not disclosed anything... classified or confidential,” she said, adding that Hedges had lived in the UAE for “several years” before he returned to Britain in 2015.
UAE to try British student on spying charges: reports
UAE to try British student on spying charges: reports
- He is to stand trial in Abu Dhabi “on charges of spying for a foreign country..."
- The attorney general said said the charges were “based on legal evidence and findings from investigations"
Lebanon says one killed in Israeli strike on Palestinian refugee camp
- NNA said “an Israeli drone” targeted a neighborhood of the Ain Al-Helweh camp
- It reported that one person was killed and an unspecified number wounded
SIDON, Lebanon: An Israeli strike on Lebanon’s largest Palestinian refugee camp killed one person on Friday, state media reported, with the Israeli army saying it had targeted the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
The official National News Agency said “an Israeli drone” targeted a neighborhood of the Ain Al-Helweh camp, which is located on the outskirts of the southern city of Sidon.
It reported that one person was killed and an unspecified number wounded.
An AFP correspondent saw smoke rising from a building in the densely populated camp as ambulances headed to the scene.
The Israeli army said in a statement that its forces “struck a Hamas command center from which terrorists operated.”
Israel has kept up regular strikes on Lebanon despite a November 2024 ceasefire that sought to halt more than a year of hostilities with the militant group Hezbollah.
Israel has also struck targets belonging to Hezbollah’s Palestinian ally Hamas, including in a raid on Ain Al-Helweh last November that killed 13 people.
The UN rights office had said 11 children were killed in that strike, which Israel said targeted a Hamas training compound, though the group denied it had military installations in Palestinian camps in Lebanon.
In October 2023, Hezbollah began launching rockets at Israel in support of Hamas at the outset of the Gaza war, triggering months of exchanges that culminated in two months of all-out war in Lebanon.
On Sunday, Lebanon said an Israeli strike near the Syrian border in the country’s east killed four people, as Israel said it targeted operatives from Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad.
