Western Morning News

Raab concerned for princess

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THE Foreign Secretary has called footage of the ruler of Dubai’s daughter “very distressin­g”, after the princess accused her father of holding her against her will.

Dominic Raab said people would want to see that Princess Latifa Al Maktoum is “alive and well”, after she said in secretly recorded videos that she feared for her life. The princess has accused her father, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, of holding her hostage in Dubai since an attempt to flee the Emirate in 2018.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the Government was “concerned” by the reports, but would “wait and see” how an investigat­ion by the United Nations unfolds.

Video messages recorded on a mobile phone, obtained by the BBC’s Panorama programme, show the princess, now 35, crouched against a wall in a bathroom at the “villa jail” where she claims to be being detained.

“It it is troubling, it is obviously very distressin­g to see that footage,” Mr Raab told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “Of course we are concerned by it.”

Asked if he would support seeing “proof of life” of the princess, the minister told Sky News: “I think that is a natural instinct and we would certainly welcome that.”

Last year, the High Court in London found that Princess Latifa’s father “ordered and orchestrat­ed” her abduction and forced return to Dubai twice, in 2002 and in 2018.

Sheikh Mohammed and the Dubai Royal Court have claimed she is safe in the loving care of her family.

 ?? BBC ?? Princess Latifa Al Maktoum
BBC Princess Latifa Al Maktoum

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