Dubai jailers ordered Briton to sign document saying human rights being upheld

A British businessman unjustly imprisoned in Dubai has urged the Foreign Office to protect him against “aggressive” prisonofficials after they tried to force him to sign a document claiming his human rights were being upheld.

- TOM WATLING

Father-of-three Ryan Cornelius, 70, has spent more than 16 years languishing in prison in the United Arab Emirates over an alleged £370m fraud. His original sentence of 10 years has been extended until 2038. The UAE says he illegally obtained a loan from the government-affiliated Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) by bribing staff members, but the United Nations says the charges of fraud are false.

Mr Cornelius and his supporters accuse the DIB of being his “effective jailers”, ensuring he remains in prison to retain property they allege was stolen from him by way of “compensation”. Despite the UAE constitution stating that all inmates should be freed when they turn 70, Mr Cornelius’s clemency appeal, endorsed by the Foreign Office, was also rejected last year.

In a plea for help to the Foreign Office, seen by The Independent, Mr Cornelius says he now fears for his safety after he refused to sign a document produced this month by prison officials that states his human rights are not being violated. Mr Cornelius is currently being held in the Al Awir Central Prison just outside of Dubai, the same complex where 18-year-old Briton Marcus Fakana is serving a one-year sentence for having sex with a then17-year-old girl last year.