GLIMMER OF HOPE FOR ‘SPY’ BRITON
Arab jailers dangle prospect of appeal or pardon after wife says: We didn’t even get to say goodbye
A YOUNG academic jailed as a British spy was offered a glimmer of hope yesterday as Arab rulers dangled the prospect of clemency.
In the face of furious UK threats, Gulf leaders held out the olive branch of an ‘amicable solution’ for Matthew Hedges after he was sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday.
Last night his wife, Daniela Tejada, was said to be ‘hopeful but cautious’. She spoke of the ‘beyond heartbreaking’ moment she watched her 31-year-old husband pronounced guilty in a fiveminute hearing in an Abu Dhabi courtroom, adding: ‘We didn’t even get to say goodbye.’
Miss Tejada accused the Foreign Office of failing to help Durham University PhD student Mr Hedges for six months, following his arrest in Dubai on May 5 after he had interviewed sources for his thesis on security policies in the Gulf.
In an excoriating interview, she claimed the UK government prized relations with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) over her helpless husband – who had been held in solitary confinement for six months and forced to sign a confession while British officials shrugged that it was ‘not our job’ to intervene.
But last night after meeting Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, Miss Tejada, 27, softened her tone and thanked him for ‘now standing up’ for Mr Hedges and doing everything to get him home.
Earlier Mr Hunt had summoned the UAE’s ambassador in London for a ‘very frank’ dressing down.
On Wednesday, after a ‘very, very scared’ Mr Hedges was convicted of being an MI6 spy, Mr Hunt had condemned the ‘totally unacceptable’ verdict and threatened ‘serious consequences’ against the UAE.
Yesterday the Gulf state denied Mr Hedges had faced a ‘kangaroo court’ and insisted the evidence he was engaged in espionage for the UK was strong.
But in a significant climbdown, its authoritarian rulers also raised the possibility of clemency or a successful court appeal, stressing this ‘sentence is not final’.
Abdulla Al Naqbi, head of legal affairs at the UAE foreign ministry, said the Briton had a chance to appeal and also ‘the right to appeal for presidential clemency’, adding that the UAE was ‘determined to protect its important strategic relationship’ with Britain. He added: ‘Both sides hope to find an amicable solution to the case.’
By chance, UAE National Day falls next Thursday, traditionally a day when pardons are granted.
A Whitehall source said it was ‘interesting’ the word clemency had been used, while Mr Hunt tweeted of having held ‘a constructive conversation’ by phone with the UAE foreign minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed. He said: ‘I believe and trust he’s working hard to resolve the situation ASAP.’
The Emiratis insisted yesterday that Mr Hedges ‘has been treated fairly’. Mr Al Naqbi said ‘compelling and powerful evidence was presented in court that included information extracted from his personal electronic devices’ as well as ‘Mr Hedges’ own confession’. He claimed it was ‘not true’ the academic had been made to sign documents he did not understand.
Yesterday Colombian-born Miss Tejada, who married Mr Hedges last year, broke down as she told Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘I imagine he is just as distraught as I am.’ She said he only got to see a British consular officer after ‘six weeks of intensive interrogation’, adding that the Foreign Office ‘just disregarded my requests’. Miss Tejada claimed: ‘They said it wasn’t part of their job… they were not obliged to make representations. I was under the impression that they were putting their interests with the UAE above the rights of a British citizen’s rightful freedom and welfare. They were stepping on eggshells.’
But later, after she had met Mr Hunt at the Foreign Office for an hour, she admitted, ‘This is not a fight I can win alone’, and thanked the Foreign Office ‘for now standing up for one of their citizens’.
Miss Tejada said: ‘We really appreciate all the positive support that has been shown to Matt. Seeing him shaking in court after being handed a life sentence and then being made to leave was beyond heartbreaking. We didn’t even get to say goodbye.
‘I really appreciate the Foreign Secretary taking the time to meet me. He has assured me that he and his team are doing everything in their power to get Matt free and return him home to me.’
Comment – Page 18
‘It was beyond heartbreaking’ ‘Return him home to me’