UAE court refuses open trial for protestors

Five pro-democracy activists on trial in the United Arab Emirates returned to court yesterday, two days after the oil-rich Gulf nation held elections for an advisory council that wields little real power.

The activists, including a blogger and an academic, were detained in April after they signed an online petition demanding constitutional changes and free elections.

They were charged in July with insulting the country’s rulers and using an online forum to conspire against the state.

Among the five, all of whom have pleaded not guilty, are blogger Ahmed Mansour and economics professor Nasser bin Ghaith, who lectured at the Abu Dhabi branch of Paris’s Sorbonne university.

The five activists briefly attended yesterday’s closed-door proceedings in Abu Dhabi’s Federal Supreme Court.

Four of the defendants, including Mansour and bin Ghaith, walked out of the courtroom after the judges refused to consider their demand to open the hearing to the public and release them from custody on bail.

A group of government supporters staged a rally in a park across from the court, denouncing the activists as traitors who were ungrateful for the cradle-to-grave privileges awarded to Emirati citizens by the ruling sheiks.

“We live in the state-of-the-art country that others can only dream of and they spread lies that we don’t get rights,” said Ahmed Jumaa, a 42-year-old businessman. “We get free education, a house and medicine, we even get money to get married. What more do they want?”

Political activity is severely restricted in the UAE, an alliance of seven semi-autonomous states, each ruled by a hereditary sheikh. There are no official opposition groups and political parties are banned.