Kurds back Dungavel detainee who fears death if he is returned to Syria

Published on Tuesday 16 June 2009 22:44

A KURDISH Syrian who "faces death" if he is returned to his home country has been given fresh hope in his bid to remain in Scotland.

JoJo Yakob lost his application for asylum last year after a tribunal said it did not believe his claims that he would be tortured if he was returned to Syria.

After he spent the past year on the run and in a string of detention centres, The Scotsman can reveal that Kurdish leaders have verified his story.

His lawyers are preparing a fresh application for asylum and hope the new evidence will persuade the immigration authorities to change their minds.

Mr Yakob fled Syria in 2005 after enduring daily beatings, electric shocks and water torture at the hands of Syria's secret police as a result of his family's involvement with an opposition Kurdish political party. He was arrested for handing out anti-government leaflets.

Mr Yakob says he suffered beatings in prison when guards found out he was gay. After several weeks, the 21-year-old escaped and was trafficked to the UK, ending up in Aberdeen before being jailed for a year for having a false passport. He was released from Polmont Young Offenders Institution and taken in by Madeline Marshall, a pensioner from Edinburgh.

The final nail in Mr Yakob's coffin appeared to have come when a judge, Lord Carloway, upheld the original immigration tribunal ruling. Mr Yakob fled to Ireland where he hoped to stow away on a ship to Canada. But he was arrested by police in Dublin and deported to London.

Since then, he has been moved around six different detention centres and is now in the Lanarkshire immigration removal facility, Dungavel.

His legal team are now preparing a fresh asylum application after representatives from the Kurdish Yekiti Party wrote to confirm his involvement with the opposition movement meant he faced persecution. Their letter states: "We, the Kurdistan Democratic Union Party in Syria, Yekiti, confirm that JoJo Yakobi was a supporter of this party and his life in danger if deported to Syria."

A second letter from the Western Kurdistan Association, which supports Syrian Kurds in exile, also confirms Mr Yakob was forced to leave Syria "because of political reason".

It says all Kurds who apply for asylum and are sent back to Syria face being arrested by the secret police and taken to a secret prison, where they are tortured and denied legal representation and medical help.

Speaking from Dungavel, Mr Yakob told The Scotsman he was hopeful he will be able to put four years of hell behind him and begin a new life in Scotland: "The Kurds have come and supported me. I'm very happy. I thought they would forget about me but they are really doing their best. The authorities wanted to send me back to my death. It was very scary. I've been sent to six different detention centres. But the staff here have been very friendly. I just want to be able to live without fear."

Opposition groups say Syria's estimated 1.7 million Kurds suffer discrimination, lack of political representation and tight restrictions on social and cultural expression. About 300,000 are denied citizenship. An estimated 150 Kurds are being held as political prisoners.

Mr Yakob arrived in the UK without any personal papers. Without a passport, it is doubtful whether Syria would even accept him if he was returned.

A spokesman for Dundee-based solicitors J Myles & Co said: "We are in the process of preparing a fresh application on behalf of Mr Yakob. That will be based on material that has become available since his last appearance at the asylum and immigration tribunal."