{"id":5009,"date":"2010-12-07T13:15:29","date_gmt":"2010-12-07T13:15:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tat.reddaisytrading.co.uk\/index.php\/2010\/12\/07\/wife-urges-release-of-detained-husband\/"},"modified":"2016-01-07T12:49:48","modified_gmt":"2016-01-07T12:49:48","slug":"wife-urges-release-of-detained-husband","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/2010\/12\/07\/wife-urges-release-of-detained-husband\/","title":{"rendered":"Wife urges release of detained husband"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\u2018Release or charge him by Christmas\u2019 plea<\/h3>\n
\"\"THE wife of a British man held without charge in Iraq for a year is calling on the UK government to step up its efforts to secure the release of her husband.<\/strong>

\nRamze Shihab Ahmed, a 68-year-old dual Iraqi-UK national who has lived in the UK since 2002, was arrested by security officials in a relative\u2019s house in the city of Mosul on 7 December 2009.

\nMr Ahmed, who had travelled to Iraq to try to secure the release of his detained son \u2018Omar, was first held in total secrecy for nearly four months before being able to phone his wife in London. He has told his wife of how he was tortured – including with electric shocks to his genitals and suffocation by plastic bags.

\nAmnesty International has launched a campaign calling for Mr Ahmed to be released unless he is charged with a recognisable criminal offence and fairly tried, as well as insisting that the alleged torture is fully investigated. <\/div>\n


\nAmnesty supporters have sent some 6,000 messages to the Foreign Secretary William Hague asking him to put pressure on the Iraqi authorities to ensure that Mr Ahmed is treated in line with international human rights standards and the Iraqi constitution.

\nHis wife, Rabiha al-Qassab, a 63-year-old former teaching assistant who lives in north-west London, said: \u201cI can hardly believe that a whole year has gone by with my husband in jail like this. It\u2019s disgraceful what they\u2019re doing to him. He doesn\u2019t even know what he\u2019s accused of.

\n\u201cAn Iraqi judge recently visited my husband and assured him that the \u2018confession\u2019 that the interrogators tortured out of him will be disregarded and that they\u2019ll re-investigate the case.

\n\u201cThis is better news but I want to see the Iraqis say either we\u2019re charging him or – much more likely – we\u2019re going to release him.

\n\u201cThe UK ought to be saying this as well. I appreciate the fact that William Hague has raised the case with the Iraqi authorities, but I\u2019d really like to see more being done now that a year has passed.

\n\u201cWhy couldn\u2019t Mr Hague insist that he must be either released or properly charged by Christmas?\u201d

\nAmnesty International UK Director Kate Allen said the case had \u201cdragged on for far too long.\u201d

\n\u201cThis shocking case has dragged on for far too long and we need to see the Iraqi authorities resolving it without further delay, she said.

\n\u201cThis man and his family have suffered enough. The torture allegations must be investigated and Ramze should be properly charged or released. The sooner, the better.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018Release or charge him by Christmas\u2019 plea THE wife of a British man held without charge in Iraq for a year is calling on the UK government to step up its efforts to secure the release of her husband. Ramze Shihab Ahmed, a 68-year-old dual Iraqi-UK national who has lived in the UK since […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5009"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5009\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}