SHARE
COPY LINK

IRAN

Sweden deports man to wrong country

Swedish police were given orders to deport a man to Iran, but instead sent him to Iraq, where he now risks 15 years in prison for claiming to be a citizen in the country, according to a report in the Expressen daily.

“The police can’t deport someone to another land than the one which has been decided,” Mikael Ribbenvik at the Migration Board (Migrationsverket) told the newspaper.

The 53-year-old man, who was born in Iraq, was deported by Saddam Hussein in the 1980s. After that he became an Iranian citizen.

He applied for residency in Sweden in 2002, but his application was rejected and in October 2010 the police in Gävle in northern Sweden were instructed to deport him back to Iran.

Why he was sent to the wrong country is unclear, but the error has been reported to the Parliamentary Ombudsman (Justitieombudsmannen – JO).

According to acquaintances of the man’s sister the man remains in jail at a police station in Baghdad.

“I travelled to Baghdad and got to visit my brother at the police station. He was in a dark cell without electricity along with several others. I could barely see him behind the bars,” the man’s sister told the Dagens Nyheter daily.

“I haven’t had contact with him in months, but my acquaintances in Baghdad say he’s still in jail.”

Gävle police have admitted to having made an error and that they now have changed their routines.

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.

TRIAL

Danish terror trial begins against Iranian separatists

Three leaders of an Iranian Arab separatist group pleaded not guilty to financing and promoting terrorism in Iran with Saudi Arabia's backing, as their trial opened in Denmark on Thursday.

Danish terror trial begins against Iranian separatists
File photo: Mads Claus Rasmussen/Ritzau Scanpix

The three risk 12 years in prison if found guilty.

Aged 39 to 50, the trio are members of the separatist organisation ASMLA (Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz), which is based in Denmark and the Netherlands and which Iran considers a terrorist group.

The three, one of whom is a Danish citizen, have been held in custody in Denmark since February 2020.

Gert Dyrn, lawyer for the eldest of the three, told AFP that in his client’s opinion “what they are charged with is legitimate resistance towards an oppressive regime.”

“They are not denying receiving money from multiple sources, including Saudi Arabia, to help the movement and help them accomplish their political aim,” Dyrn said. 

His client has lived as a refugee in Denmark since 2006. 

According to the charge sheet seen by AFP, the three received around 30 million kroner (four million euros, $4.9 million) for ASMLA and its armed branch, through bank accounts in Austria and the United Arab Emirates.

The trio is also accused of spying on people and organisations in Denmark between 2012 and 2020 for Saudi intelligence.

Finally, they are also accused of promoting terrorism and “encouraging the activities of the terrorist movement Jaish Al-Adl, which has activities in Iran, by supporting them with advice, promotion, and coordinating attacks.”

The case dates back to 2018 when one of the three was the target of a foiled attack on Danish soil believed to be sponsored by the Iranian regime in retaliation for the killing of 24 people in Ahvaz, southwestern Iran, in September 2018.

READ ALSO:

Tehran formally denied the attack plan in Denmark, but a Danish court last year jailed a Norwegian-Iranian for seven years for his role in the plot. 

That attack put Danish authorities on the trail of the trio’s ASMLA activities.

Sunni Saudi Arabia is the main rival in the Middle East of Shia Iran, and Tehran regularly accuses it, along with Israel and the United States, of supporting separatist groups.

Lawyer Gert Dyrn said this was “the first case in Denmark within terror law where you have to consider who is a terrorist and who is a freedom fighter.”

SHOW COMMENTS