Day: March 21, 2015

MDP carries out nationwide “Maldivians for justice” protests

The opposition Maldivian Democratic Party carried out protests across the country on Friday under the banner “Maldivians for Justice,” calling for the release of former President Mohamed Nasheed.

Demonstrations took place from Haa Dhaalu Kulhudhufushi and Raa Meedhoo in the north to the Addu City in the south. Hundreds of supporters in capital Malé offered a special prayer at the Islamic Center after Friday prayers, and thousands participated in a protest march at 9:30pm.

Speaking at an opposition march for the first time, MP Ahmed Mahloof said: “Former President Nasheed is loved by thousands of Maldivians and his jailing will not bring any gain to President Yameen.”

The MP for Galolhu South was expelled from the ruling Progressive Party of Maldives for allegedly defaming President Abdulla Yameen.

Mahloof accused the government of prosecuting the opposition leader as well as former Defence Minister Mohamed Nazim in a conspiracy to eliminate political opponents.

He also praised MDP MP Ismail Fayyaz, who was arrested from a protest and is being held in remand detention after he refused to accept the Criminal Court’s condition of not participating in protests for 60 days.

A motorcycle rally took place in Kulhudhufushi in the afternoon, whilst hundreds wearing black gathered for a rally at the Feydhoo harbor in the southernmost Addu City.

Earlier in the day, hundreds of MDP supporters participated in a special prayer outside the Islamic Centre after Friday prayers.

“Brutality reigns in our country. Justice abolished. O Allah! May our country be saved from the brutality of our rulers, and may we be taken to safer shores,” the prayer stated.

“Our beloved leader, a man loved by a majority of us, Mohamed Nasheed, has been unjustly sentenced and imprisoned. He has suffered and continues to suffer. O Allah! Save Mohamed Nasheed from this brutality.”

The prayer gathering prompted Home Minister Umar Naseer to call for police action against usng mosques and surrounding areas to “make political statements.”

The MDP condemned Naseer’s “warning” in a statement today, describing the tweet as “shocking.”

“Mosques are used for worship and prayer. The acts of brutality in the Maldives are prohibited and praying to be saved from such acts is encouraged in Islam. We see interfering with citizens of a Muslim country’s praying and threatening them as this government’s brutality getting to a whole new level,” read the statement.

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Canada appalled by guilty verdict for Nasheed

Canada is appalled by the Maldives’ prosecution of former President Mohamed Nasheed on terrorism charges, Parliamentary Secretary Deepak Obhrai has said in a statement on Wednesday.

“This verdict goes against the core principles of the Commonwealth, and Canada will continue to call on Maldives to reaffirm its commitment to democracy, human rights and the rule of law,” the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs for International Human Rights said.

Nasheed was convicted of terrorism and sentenced to 13 years in jail over the military’s detention of Criminal Court Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed in 2012.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein and UN Special Rapporteur for Independence of Judges and Lawyers Gabriela Knaul last week condemned the apparent lack of due process in Nasheed’s trial.

The rushed trial was marred with several irregularities, including the Criminal Court’s refusal to call defence witnesses, grant Nasheed adequate time to prepare defence and appoint new legal representation when his lawyers resigned half-way through the trial.

“The manner in which the trial was conducted infringes basic and fundamental concepts of due process. The result brings Maldives’ justice system into disrepute and is symptomatic of backsliding in Maldives’ commitment to domestic and international human rights obligations and democratic principles, which is causing growing tensions in the country,” Obhrai said.

President Abdulla Yameen on March 15 called on all parties to respect the Criminal Court’s verdict against Nasheed.

“The government calls on its international partners to engage constructively, based on mutual respect and dialogue in consolidating and strengthening democratic values and institutions in the country,” read the brief statement.

On February 24, Foreign Minister Dunya Maumoon blasted a February 23 Canadian statement expressing concern over Nasheed’s arrest ahead of the surprise trial.

At the time, Canadian Foreign Minister Rob Nicholson said “the brutal and unjustified treatment of the former president call into question Maldives’ commitment to due process and democratic principles.

Dunya dismissed Nicholson’s statement as “blatantly untrue,” adding: “I don’t think they know what actually is happening here.”

 

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Nasheed’s wife seeks India’s help in assuring opposition leader’s safety

Former President Mohamed Nasheed’s wife Laila Ali has urged Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to free her husband from jail and assure his safety.

“I fear for his life in prison. This week I got some information from close friends that people in the cabinet as well as some retired and serving armed forces personnel are plotting to kill him in jail and make it look like he committed suicide,” she told India’s Economic Times today.

The opposition leader was sentenced to 13 years in jail on March 13 over the military’s detention of Criminal Court Chief Judge Abdulla Mohamed in 2012.

He is being kept at Dhoonidhoo Island Remand Center until a special “prison apartment” is built in Maafushi jail, Home Minister Umar Naseer has said.

The former First Lady called Nasheed’s trial a “total sham” and requested India to intervene to restore the rule of law in the Maldives.

“I do not know what it will take PM Modi to do it but my wish is that India helps in ensuring that my husband is freed unconditionally and that representative democracy is restored. How India does it is for the PM to decide,” she said.

Laila told local media on Thursday she had written to President Abdulla Yameen and former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom as well as the home minister and police commissioner seeking assurances of Nasheed’s safety.

“In my letter, I expressed my grave concern and told them my husband is in your care. You must give me assurance, in writing or by your actions, that he would not come under any physical or psychological harm.”

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State concludes witness testimony in former Defence Minister Nazim’s trial

Three anonymised police officers provided testimony with serious contradictions last week in former Defence Minister Mohamed Nazim’s trial on weapons possession charges.

The three officers were part of a search team during the controversial midnight raid on Nazim’s house on January 18. Their testimony indicated the Maldives Police Services did not follow stringent police regulations in conducting the search.

The search team did not videotape the raid as required, and provided conflicting testimony on whether mandatory photographs were taken. One witness said photos were only taken of the illegal weapons, while a second witness said photographs were taken from the moment the raid began.

Nazim — accused of smuggling illegal weapons — maintains he was framed by rogue SWAT police officers on the orders of Tourism Minister Ahmed Adeeb.

The three officers said they entered Nazim’s apartment after masked SWAT officers broke down the then-defence minister’s door. Nazim’s wife and two daughters were inside the apartment’s living room with the officers at the time, they said.

Police claimed to have discovered three bullets and a pistol in a black bag in a bedside drawer during the raid. Nazim was subsequently dismissed and arrested on additional charges of treason and terrorism.

If convicted of smuggling weapons, the retired colonel faces a jail term between ten and 15 years.

State prosecutors have now concluded summoning witnesses. A total of six individuals testified in four hearings last week. They included five police officers and one Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) officer.

The defence is to call witnesses at the next hearing on Sunday.

Police procedures

The Criminal Court held four hearings on March 17, 18 and 19. Nazim’s defence team questioned the three anonymised police witnesses on procedures followed during raid, search and chain of custody in evidence.

At the March 17 hearing, the chief Investigative Officer (IO) said he had sought a court warrant to search Nazim’s apartment building, Galholhu Enif, on his superior’s orders.

Intelligence information indicated weapons were kept either on the seventh or eighth floor, he said via telephone. The search team entered Nazim’s apartment ten to 15 minutes after SWAT officers entered the apartment and secured the premises, he said.

The police team searched Nazim’s bedroom first, in his presence, when the weapons were discovered, he said. Police officers searched all of Nazim’s apartment and a second apartment on the eighth floor, but did not search the seventh floor, he said.

The IO said Nazim had fully cooperated with the search. The police did not keep a record of observations in a special notebook or issue a list of items confiscated from the former defence minister’s home as per regulations, the cross-examination revealed.

One anonymised witness on March 18 said the search team did not check the ceiling, while the second said the team brought in a chair to check the ceiling and cupboards.

The legal team had previously claimed that the items found at Nazim’s house were planted by the police, saying that officers spent ten minutes inside Nazim’s bedroom unsupervised before the search began. Police have called the claims “untrue” and “baseless”.

On March 19, state prosecutors summoned Sub Inspector Ameen Abdul Gayoom regarding a forensic digital analysis report of a pen drive confiscated from Nazim’s apartment along with the weapons. The state has previously said documents on the pen drive indicate Nazim was plotting to harm President Abdulla Yameen, Commissioner of Police Hussein Waheed and Tourism Minister Ahmed Adeeb.

Journalists and observers were barred from the defence’s cross-examination of Gayoom due to the confidential nature of the documents on the pen drive.

Prosecutors then summoned MNDF First Lieutenant Mohamed Nazeem to prove the pistol and bullets were functioning. Nazeem said the a weapons expert had fired the pistol in his presence, but they had not tested the bullets. However, a visual inspection shows the bullets were not dummy rounds, he said.

Defence lawyers have named President Yameen, Commissioner Waheed, Chief of Defence Forces Major General Ahmed Shiyam, Home Minister Umar Naseer and several senior ranking police and military officers as witnesses to prove charges were fabricated in a conspiracy engineered by Adeeb.

The Criminal Court said the court would summon defence witnesses only if they appear to negate the prosecution’s evidence.

On March 7, lawyer Maumoon Hameed claimed Adeeb framed Nazim after the former defence minister alerted President Yameen of the tourism minister using SO SWAT officers to commit criminal acts, including the chopping down of all of Malé City’s areca palms in October last year.

The tourism minister has said he was “shocked” by the allegations, and has dismissed accusations as lies.

Defence lawyers have also called Superintendent of Police Ahmed Nafiz and former head of police’s intelligence directorate, Mohamed ‘MC’ Hameed, to prove a complaint was lodged over SO officer’s alleged criminal activities, and that SO officers had engaged in criminal activity.

The defence has also called senior ranking police and military officers to prove that a Special Protection Group Corporal had lost a 9mm Browning pistol at Shangri-La resort in 2014, that police officers did not follow due process in raiding and searching Nazim’s residence, and that police intelligence had not received any information that illegal weapons were smuggled into Malé prior to the raid.

The MNDF promptly dismissed allegations of missing weapons.

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Young man stabbed to death in Mundoo

A 29-year-old man was stabbed to death on Laamu Atoll Mundoo Island on Friday night.

According to local media, Ali Ziyadham was stabbed in his arms, thighs, back and neck. He was dead when he was brought to the Mundoo Health Center at 11:10pm.

“Currently, we have one suspect under arrest, we are working on finding others associated with the incident,” the Maldives Police Services said in a statement today.

Ziyadham has a criminal record of drug abuse and theft, the police said.

Mundoo residents told local media Ziyadham was murdered in a dispute over the distribution of moonshine.

 

 

 

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Child abuse suspect arrested in Fuvahmulah

A 37-year-old man has been arrested from Fuvahmulah Island on suspicion of child abuse on Friday.

According to the Maldives Police Services, an arrest warrant was issued after the Family and Child Protection Services Unit on Fuvahmulah reported a case of sexual abuse of a child.

“Since cases of child abuse are increasing, we advise all parents and guardians to pay special attention and protect innocent children from such harm. We also suggest that, even if you suspect anyone of such acts of harm, to do everything you can to protect the child and report it to the authorities,” the police urged.

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Hundreds affected after massive fire breaks out at warehouse in Malé

Additional reporting by Hassan Mohamed 

A number of families have been forced out of their homes after a massive fire broke out in a warehouse in Malé on Thursday night (March 19), sending plumes of flame and smoke 60 feet into the air.

The two-storey Lily Store warehouse in Maafanu ward was completely destroyed, causing damages worth an estimated MVR30 million (US$1.9 million), according to Lily Store owner Ahmed Naseer.

Homes in the area were evacuated around 11:15pm as the flames leapt from Maafanu Oak Villa to adjacent buildings in the narrow alley. Residents first heard loud cracking noises like gunfire or explosions before the flames were visible.

Apartment opposite warehouse
Apartment opposite warehouse

Deodorant bottles, gas cylinders, one lorry, and three pickups were inside the warehouse.

All the windows of the multi-storey building opposite the warehouse were shattered and deodorant bottles were later found inside its apartments.

According to the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) fire and rescue service, the fire was contained around 12:00am and completely extinguished about two hours later with members of the public working alongside police officers and firemen.

Fire lorries were unable to use water cannons for nearly 30 minutes with the narrow streets surrounding the warehouse packed with panic-stricken and fleeing residents.

Residents from the neighbourhood told Minivan News that many people emerged from their homes in night dresses, and some were carrying crying toddlers.

Aftermath

DSC_9477-1On Saturday morning, smoke was still spewing out of the burnt-down warehouse.

The fire had spread to the third floor of an adjacent building as well as a construction site whilst the roof of a nearby house had collapsed.

The apartment now lies in ruins and many houses were looted after residents fled.

Malé City Councilor Shamau Shareef said a family of ten was sheltering at Malé’s Social Centre with the neighbourhood home to about 500 people still engulfed in smoke.

Shamau said about four families were forced out of their homes with their buildings uninhabitable, walls still scalding hot and belongings burnt.

The opposition Maldivian Democratic Party councillor called on MNDF and police to expedite cleaning up the area as the “toxic fumes are not safe to breathe.” He also urged the government to provide temporary shelter to the four affected families.

However, Shamau commended the MNDF and police both for their prompt response and safely evacuating the neighbourhood.

DSC_9470-1Apart from an elderly man reportedly treated at the Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital for smoke inhalation, no one was harmed in the fire.

A middle-aged woman seeking refuge at the social centre told Minivan News that the explosions she heard “sounded like gunfire.”

“We were all sleeping when the fire broke out. I was woken up by very loud explosions. Soon someone started knocking on the door loudly and asked us to evacuate,” she recalled.

“My child still is only eating now, yesterday he barely ate anything and had trouble sleeping,” she said, pointing to her 13-year-old son having biscuits and tea at the social centre’s small cafeteria.

She expressed gratitude to the Disaster Management Centre for arranging temporary shelter and providing food and other essentials.

“I understand it is a difficult time for everyone. We do not have all the luxuries we had at home. But I am happy with what they have done for us,” she said.

A resident of the neighbourhood, Ali Rasheed, 52, said his family has been sleeping and eating at friend’sDSC_9474-1 places as living in their home was “unbearable” because of the smoke.

“I believe the government should be held accountable for this. The fire trucks were not able to provide water until much later,” he said.

Lily Store owner Naseer told local media that nothing was salvaged from the warehouse, which he said was stored with newly imported goods ten days ago. However, the warehouse was insured, Naseer said.

Vice President Dr Mohamed Jameel Ahmed visited the damaged homes this morning.

Suspected arson

A police media official confirmed today that a separate fire occurred at Ekuveni around 12:00am on Thursday night, less than an hour after the warehouse fire broke out.

Police began patrolling the city whilst MNDF officers were deployed to petrol sheds and other strategic locations.

A security guard at the sports complex told Minivan News that he saw two “youngsters on a motorcycle” hurl what appeared to be petrol bombs into the premises. However, the fires were quickly extinguished.

“I immediately called the police and started working on extinguishing the fire,” he said.

The second fire fueled speculation of coordinated attacks, and police have not ruled out arson in the warehouse fire, saying all lines of inquiry were open in the ongoing investigation.

Photo by Laisha Mohamed Shakir
Photo by Laisha Mohamed Shakir

“We are working hard to identify those involved in the dangerous fire in Malé on Thursday night, and will take strict action against them,” Police Commissioner Hussain Waheed wrote on Facebook today.

Cover photo by Laisha Mohamed Shakir

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Comment: Imprisoning of former president casts doubt on judiciary

This article first appeared in The Times on March 19. 

The Maldives’ tourist board continues to beam its slogan “the sunny side of life” through calls to boycott the islands over the recent 13 years’ imprisonment of former President Mohamed Nasheed, the first democratically elected President. Richard Branson tweeted that this latest action by those in power had gone “beyond a joke”. A joke legal system is not funny.

Educated in the UK, Mr. Nasheed’s stated and largely executed aims are introducing and enforcing fundamental rights in compliance with international law. He was attempting to drive the Maldives into a democratic structure after the 30-year dictatorship of Maumoon Abdul Gayoom. The current Constitution was enacted on 7 August 2008, the State’s first ever multi-party presidential elections with international pre-requisite rights took place between October 2008 and 9th May 2009.

On 5th February 2011 the Maldives held its first ever multi-party local elections as required under the Constitution and newly enacted Decentralization Act. In 2009 former President Nasheed addressed issues of press freedom so as to raise the Maldives out of a ranking of 129 out of 169 countries to 51/52. He became a global leader against climate change and his charisma on the world stage led to David Cameron, in an interview in November 2011, describing him as “my new best friend”.

The former President also made unpopular attempts at judicial reform including entrenching judicial independence in the Constitution. Many Judges in the Maldives are poorly educated with no legal training, including those who ultimately tried and convicted the former President. In a preliminary statement, following hearings in 2012, the UN Human Rights Committee stated that it is “deeply concerned about the state of the judiciary in the Maldives” and “the state has admitted that this body’s independence is seriously compromised.

Mohamed Nasheed lost power on 7 February 2012 in an alleged coup. In April 2013, the former President was charged with abusing his powers through the unlawful arrest and island detention of Chief Judge Mohamed Abdulla on 17 January 2012. This charge was withdrawn on 16th February 2015 but then in a surprise move, re-emerged on 22nd February 2015, based on the same allegation, as a terrorism charge.

The Former President was taken from his home on that date and detained in Dhoonidho prison, an institution with inglorious association with torture.

The accusation of the detention of a Judge is a serious matter but the underlying narrative cannot be ignored. In early 2012, the former President was fighting to hold power and stability. The Maldives was aflame with language of incitement against the former President and his reforms. There were even calls to arrest and flog the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay after she had suggested in Parliament that punishment by flogging should be reviewed (in line with the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights). The Maldives Parliamentary Select Committee subsequently found the President to have been under life or death pressures. During the UN Human Rights Committee’s session in 2012 a panel member noted the “troubling role of the judiciary at the centre” of the disputed free transfer of power on February 7th 2012.

Whilst an action of unlawful detention against a Judge cannot be ignored, context and public interest also should not be ignored when exercising the discretion to prosecute. Alternatives such as an Independent Public Inquiry could have been considered.

The former President’s trial proceeded over 19 days, often late at night. Two of the Judges also were witnesses in the case. They refused to recuse themselves. The defence was refused the right to call witnesses in its own defence. Judge Didi referred to the former President needing to prove his innocence rather than there being a presumption of innocence. On the 9th March 2015 the defence lawyers withdrew from the case after repeatedly having been refused time to prepare.

On the 13th March 2015 the Former President stood alone as he was convicted and sentenced to the near maximum term of imprisonment.

But whilst the circus court is dismantled after its recent performance, it is democracy opponents that are cheering the loudest.

Kirsty Brimelow QC is a barrister with London’s Doughty Street Chambers. She has represented the Chief Justice of Trinidad and Tobago and the Chief Justice of Gibraltar, and currently is acting for the former President of the Maldives Mohamed Nasheed. 

All comment pieces are the sole view of the author and do not reflect the editorial policy of Minivan News. If you would like to write an opinion piece, please send proposals to [email protected]

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Tourist arrivals reach record high in February

Tourist arrivals reached an all-time record level for a single month with 120,468 visitors in February, the Ministry of Tourism has revealed.

Arrivals in February was 8.8 percent higher than the same period last year, which was “a significant improvement compared to the negative growth (-7.8 percent) registered in January 2015,” the tourism ministry observed in a statement on Thursday (March 19).

“With this boost, the total arrivals at end February 2015 was 217,541, an increase of +0.7 percent compared with the 216,001 tourists that visited during the same period of 2014,” the ministry noted.

The occupancy rate meanwhile declined by 4.8 percent this year, with an average occupancy rate of 80.8 percent. The average duration of stay was six days.

After falling 12.2 percent in December and 33.1 percent in January, Chinese arrivals bounced back in February with a 30.5 growth compared to February 2014.

A total of 43,349 Chinese tourists visited the Maldives last month.

At a press conference last week, Tourism Minister Ahmed Adeeb suggested that Chinese visitors increased sharply as the Chinese New Year was on February 13.

Adeeb noted that overall arrivals growth was at about one percent compared to the first two months of 2014.

“So our travel trends is not falling. The past month was a very profitable month,” he said.

However, the Maldives Inland Revenue Authority (MIRA) revealed earlier this month that revenue collection was 17.6 percent below forecasts due to “the decrease in tourism related revenues by 17 percent as tourist arrivals did not meet expectations.”

MIRA also revealed that US$2.2 million was collected last month as airport service charge, compared to US$2.3 million in February 2014.

However, Adeeb said income from Tourism Goods and Services Tax (T-GST) for February would be collected in March, and would reflect the arrivals hike.

Referring to travel alerts issued by the UK in the wake of political unrest sparked by the arrest of former President Mohamed Nasheed on February 22, Adeeb noted that tourists were only advised to avoid Malé due to demonstrations.

Asked if arrivals could decline in March due to the ongoing political crisis, Adeeb said the tourism ministry has been monitoring booking cancellations.

“Our monitoring shows there have been no booking cancelations in March,” he said, adding that he expected arrivals to remain unchanged from March 2014.

Condemning calls for tourism boycott, Adeeb said the government was countering the social media campaign by opposition supporters through marketing efforts by PR firms.

Adeeb suggested the tourism boycott campaign would not have “much of an impact.”

Regional markets

Europe retained top spot as the largest regional source market for tourist arrivals with a 49.3 percent market share in 2015.

However, with 107,263 visitors so far this year, total arrivals from Europe registered a marginal decline of 0.8 percent.

European arrivals in February declined by 1.9 percent compared to the same period last year on the back of a steep 53.4 percent decline in arrivals from Russia.

However, arrivals from the United Kingdom and Germany increased by 10.6 percent and 10.3 percent, respectively. The number of Italian tourists also grew by 10.3 percent compared to February 2014.

Total arrivals from Western Europe declined by 2.9 percent due to a fall of 15.5 percent in arrivals from France, which the tourism ministry said has been posting negative growth since July 2014.

In terms of individual markets, China remains the largest source market with a 29.3 percent market share, followed by Italy, the United Kingdom, and Germany.

Both the national carrier Maldivian Airlines and Mega Maldives launched direct weekly flights to Chinese cities during February.

The Maldives Marketing and Tourism Development Corporation (MMPRC) also conducted roadshows in three Indian cities last month to promote the Maldives as a destination for Indian tourists.

With 4,235 visitors, arrivals from India grew by 17.8 percent in February with a market share of 3.7 percent.

“During the last two months of 2015, while important markets such as Russia, and Japan registered declines of -43.9 percent and -0.6 percent respectively, significant increases were recorded from Denmark (+82.8 percent), United Arab Emirates (+47.9 percent), Brazil (+44.6 percent), Spain (+40 percent) and Romania (+33.9 percent) at the end of the period,” the ministry noted.

At the end of February, the Maldives had 308 registered establishments in operation with a bed capacity of 27,670.

“The operational capacity included 106 resorts with 23,247 beds, 15 hotels with 1,508 beds, 106 guest houses with 1,568 beds and 81 safari vessels with 1,367 beds,” the ministry revealed.

“The total tourist bed nights of these operational establishments at the end of the period was 1,313,259 which was a drop (-3.7 percent) compared with the same period of 2014.”

Related to this story

Tourist arrivals decline in January as Chinese arrivals decline

Maldives’ resorts among the best in the world, but industry insiders express concern over green tax

1.4 million figure for 2014 tourist arrivals incorrect, says tourism minister

Expansion of economic activity in third quarter driven by tourism sector: MMA

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