HRW Urges UAE to Allow Appeals for Expelled Lebanese, Gazans

Human Rights Watch (HRW) urged on Monday the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to allow hundreds of deported Lebanese citizens and people from Gaza to appeal their expulsions.
In a letter to the UAE government, HRW charged that the UAE has expelled at least 120 Lebanese families and "scores of Palestinians, mainly from Gaza," since June 2009 without due process.

"It's now been more than a year since the UAE started deporting hundreds of Lebanese and Gazans, and the government has yet to give any adequate justification," Sarah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

According to HRW, interrogations of deportees surrounding their affiliation to Hizbullah and other groups also "raise concerns that the expulsions were politically motivated."

"The UAE prides itself as a land of opportunity for Arabs from across the region, but these cases illustrate that these opportunities rest on shifting sands," Whitson said.

HRW urged the UAE government to suspend any deportation pending an appeal and to "publicly state the steps each deported person wishing to appeal his or her expulsion order may take."