Kazakhstan citizens detained in UAE might face capital punishment

By Zulfiya Bainekeeva

Kazakhstan’s citizens detained by the UAE police might face capital punishment. Residents of Kazakhstan’s Uralsk have been indicted on charges of committing murder, frauds and running an organized crime group.

Kazakhstan’s General Prosecutor Office has already started talks on having the Kazakhstan’s citizens extradited. 

“The crimes include a murder, financial fraud and running an organized crime group (…) No decisions on extraditing any of the 10 people has been made so far”, Vice General Prosecutor Johan Merkel said in an interview for the Kazakh TV Channel.

The crimes committed are considered to be grave crimes in the UAE and are punishable with life terms and death penalty. To detain the Kazakh criminals, the UAE police deployed a massive operation. In the middle of the night they raided a house on the outskirts of Dubai and detained all the people, seizing some PCs and other gadgets. The UAE police promise to consider extraditing the Kazakhs in December.

To recall, the first person who was arrested was Myrzabek Kautbaev, the citizen of Atyrau. He was arrested at the Dubai International Airport when he and his grandmother were passing through the passport control point (see "Atyrau citizen arrested in Dubai").

The relatives of the detained learnt additional news from Kazakh TV channels. They approached the Ministry of Internal Affiars, the Foreign Ministry and Embassy, but until today they haven't heard from them any news.

Aigul Abougalieva, Kautbaev's mother, states that news distributed by mass media, are incorrect: 

- One of the TV channels broadcasted the news. When we called them, they appologized and said that they made a mistake. In the evening news they did not broadcast it. We, all the relatives of the detained, today are travelling to Astana. The official state agencies have not informed us yet. The Ambassador over the phone said that all the detained are sitting somewhere in Dubai, but where exactly- he doesn't know. He also said that this week they are expecting to receive full information about the case.  

Examples of crimes and offences punishable by death in United Arab Emirates: murder, perjury, terrorism-related offenses, rape, rape of child, drug trafficking, drug possession, adultery (under Shari’a Law), treason, espionage, etc.