After arrival in Lyon: another torture complaint against Interpol boss Al

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Ahmed Naser al-Raisi in November 2021 during an Interpol event in Turkey

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Isa Terli/Anadolu/Getty Images

At the end of November, Ahmed Naser Al-Raisi was elected the new President of Interpol.

At the time of his election, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) major-general was pending torture in at least five countries.

Now another one has been added.

William Bourdon, the lawyer for UAE-imprisoned human rights defender and blogger Ahmed Mansour, has filed a lawsuit against Al-Raisi as he was making his first visit to the International Police Agency's headquarters in Lyon.

Bourdon said he filed the lawsuit in a Paris court under the principle of universal jurisdiction.

According to this, certain particularly serious crimes such as torture and war crimes can be prosecuted in all countries that recognize this principle.

The United Arab Emirates had previously denied all allegations of torture against Al-Raisi.

Mansour is serving a 10-year prison sentence in the United Arab Emirates for "insulting the status and reputation of the United Arab Emirates" and its leaders on social media.

Two Brits are also filing a complaint in France

Separately, the lawyers of two Brits who accused Al-Raisi of torture filed a criminal complaint on Tuesday with the investigating judges of the Paris Tribunal's Special Unit for Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes.

"The presence of Al-Raisi on French territory triggers the universal jurisdiction of French courts and immunity cannot be invoked," said Rodney Dixon, a lawyer for Britons Matthew Hedges and Ali Issa Ahmad.

Hedges was jailed in the United Arab Emirates for nearly seven months in 2018 on espionage charges and said he was tortured and spent months in solitary confinement. He was initially sentenced to life imprisonment, but was pardoned after intervention by the British Foreign Office. Ahmad, a football fan, says he was tortured by the UAE security service during the 2019 Asian Cup football tournament.

They filed a torture complaint against Al-Raisi with the prosecutor's office of the Paris Tribunal in October.

That lawsuit is pending, Dixon said.

The criminal complaint, filed directly with the tribunal's judges on Tuesday, means the French judges "should promptly launch an investigation into the allegations against him," Dixon said.

“Under French law, an open investigation could result in Al-Raisi being detained for questioning while he is on French territory, either now or when he returns.”

svs/AP