UAE intelligence chief Hamad Al Mazroui sitting opposite the U.S.
Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides at a lunch on March 29 [photo credit:
@USAmbIsrael]
The Freedom Initiative, a Washington-based organisation advocating
for political prisoners in Egypt and Saudi Arabia has published two reports
in recent years investigating Arab regimes’ transnational campaigns
against dissidents. Their October 2021 report on Saudi Arabia, which is
based on around thirty interviews and documentation from a further ten
legal cases, found over 90% of respondents reported a worsening
situation since 2017.
“We don’t feel safe, not only Saudis, but also Americans, in Europe
or America or anywhere in the world” said Saudi dissident Areej
al-Sadhan, an American citizen targeted by the Saudis in Geneva. Her brother Abdulrahman was jailed for twenty years for tweeting criticism of the MbS regime (see our newsletter of 13 May 2021.)
She has campaigned tirelessly on his behalf and frequently criticises
the regime that jailed Abdulrahman: “As long as there are no
consequences to events such as the murder of Khashoggi, with no real
consequences - there will be another Khashoggi out there…it could be any
one of us.”
In January the Telegraph
(paywall) reported that leading London-based Saudi dissident Yahya
Assiri and his family have received multiple death threats over the last
two years. Their car has been broken into and they have been the
victims of electronic surveillance.
Last August a large knife was left outside Mr Assiri’s kitchen window
and the same day he was sent knife emojis and the word “soon” in Arabic
on social media. UK police visited his home but refused to examine the
knife for fingerprints or nearby CCTV on the basis no crime had been
committed and it would be a waste of money. When Mr Assiri begged them
to look him up online to prove he was a well-known activist they
allegedly declined on the basis that to do so would be biased.
As Arab Digest has previously reported, Arab postgraduate students living in the West are among the main targets of Arab regimes. Court documents reviewed by the Freedom Initiative
include information about how the Saudi embassy in the US uses the
heads of student clubs to surveil dissident activities there.
UAE postgraduate student surveillance in the US is overseen by de facto ruler Mohammed bin Zayed’s intelligence chief Hamad Al Mazroui.
He makes frequent visits to different American cities to meet students
and their handlers, and anyone suspected of criticising MbZ is reported
to state security, their allowances are cut and they are summoned back
home.
In Germany, Egyptian dissidents report foreign intelligence
operations against them have been stepped up and staff numbers at the
Egyptian embassy in Berlin have nearly doubled since Egypt and Germany signed their controversial security agreement in July 2016.
In a signal to Sisi to go easy on the espionage, earlier this month a Berlin court convicted a man of spying for Egypt while working at German Chancellor Angela Merkel's press office.
Prosecutors said Amin K., a German citizen of Egyptian origin, had been providing information
to Egypt's General Intelligence Service (GIS) between July 2010 and
2019. During the last three years of his work he was in constant contact
with a man accredited as an advisor at the Egyptian Embassy in Berlin.
In a separate case in Berlin an Egyptian man said he had been
arrested and jailed in Egypt for, he believed, attending an anti-Sisi
protest in Germany in 2015. He had been photographed there by people who
he believes were working for Egypt's intelligence service.
"Egyptian intelligence has deployed agents across Europe to keep an eye on critics of the Sisi regime” said
Amr Magdi, Middle East and North Africa researcher at HRW. “As a
result, exiled Egyptian journalists are now self-censoring themselves
(and) academics are choosing less sensitive topics.”