|
Australian 'terrorist'
case under scrutiny
PM - Monday, 15 November , 2004 18:18:23
Reporter: Michael Vincent
MARK COLVIN: The name of David Hicks is known to most
Australians after his two years at Guantanamo Bay, but
few would have heard of another Adelaide resident,
Noorpolat Abdulla. Yet Mr Abdulla is the first
Australian to be convicted of terrorism after
September 11th.
Noorpolat Abdulla was living in the central Asian
republic of Kazakhstan, next door to China, at the
time of his arrest and he now languishes in a prison
described as a former Stalinist labour camp.
But Mr Abdulla's family strongly protests their eldest
son's innocence. They say he is a political activist
who was jailed for helping people who had escaped from
China.
But the Australian Government, which did protest
against the closed court process, and is supporting Mr
Abdulla's appeal for clemency, says it's done all it
can for him.
Michael Vincent reports.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Noorpolat Abdulla is an Australian
citizen of almost 20 years. But he was living in
Kazakhstan in Central Asia when trouble came calling.
Noorpolat Abdulla's wife remembers the knock on the
door from men saying they were KGB.
RABIYA ABDULLA: One morning, we're having our
breakfast and two policemen came to our house and they
say they are from KGB and they took my husband. They
say they would like to ask a few questions from him.
MICHAEL VINCENT: That was just over four years ago.
Rabiya Abdulla has returned to Australia. Her husband
remains in a Kazak prison – a convicted terrorist.
It's been a tortured road for the Abdulla family. The
Abdullas are from an ethnic minority called the
Uighurs – Muslims whose land lies in the west of
China, over the border from Kazakhstan.
The Uighurs accuse Beijing of massive human rights
abuses. In return, the Chinese accuse the Uighurs of
terrorism.
Noorpolat Abdulla grew up in Adelaide, studying at
school, then TAFE. He would hear about the plight of
his people every night around the dinner table.
His father, Mohammed Abdulla.
MOHAMMED ABDULLA (translated): It's just like you,
eating a meal three times a day. In every family
there's always talking about our history, our
background, our movement for freedom.
MICHAEL VINCENT: So in 1998, Noorpolat Abdulla went
back to Central Asia – not to his homeland, but
neighbouring Kazakhstan. There, with his wife and
their young son, he built a business trading wool. His
family says he also helped fellow Uighurs who had
escaped from China.
Rabiya Abdulla.
RABIYA ABDULLA: He just working like a translator, yes.
That's all he did.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Kazak authorities were under pressure
from China to crack down on Uighur activists. After
two Kazak police were shot dead in September 2000,
Noorpolat Abdulla and about 100 other people were
rounded up for questioning.
The Abdulla family maintain that the Kazak authorities
fabricated evidence which was used to place him on
trial.
Police even claimed they had a witness who could link
Noopolat Abdulla with Osama bin Laden – a claim that
gets short thrift from the family.
RABIYA ABDULLA: No, never. (Laughing). Never.
MICHAEL VINCENT: The witness making the bin Laden
claim disappeared before the trials. The judge was
unimpressed by the evidence and returned the case to
the police for re-examination. And it seems the case
did improve. At a second trial in October 2001,
Noorpolat Abdulla was convicted and sentenced to 15
years jail.
Australian officials were denied access to both trials,
and their protests about the process were rejected.
Meanwhile Noorpolat Abdulla's family, some of whom
visited him in prison soon after his conviction, were
shocked by his treatment.
His sister-in-law, Isabiyra Shamsedin (phonetic)
ISABIYRA SHAMSEDIN: They torturing him. After that,
they just looked at the Australian passport and just
spit on it and they said, "oh, we can do whatever we
want, because you are in our custody. Your Australian
citizenship passport is nothing to us".
MICHAEL VINCENT: Noorpolat Abdulla's prison was in
remote location and was once part of Stalin's gulag.
Two years ago, Australian consular officials noted the
appalling conditions.
EXTRACT FROM CONSULAR NOTE: There was an incident a
few months ago in which 10 prisoners had cut their
stomachs open in protest at the harshness of the
conditions.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Noorpolat Abdulla has told Australian
officials who've visited him, that he's been beaten,
held in cage in the cold and made to stand still for
14 hours. But Bruce Billson, the Parliamentary
Secretary responsible for Australians in prisons
overseas, sees no grounds to intervene.
BRUCE BILLSON: The last most recent visit to Mr
Abdulla, there was no concerns expressed about his
treatment. He seemed well given the circumstance.
KAY DANES: It's a case of deja vu for me.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Kay Danes can empathise with
Noorpolat Abdulla's plight. Four years ago, she and
her husband spent 11 months in a jail in Laos, before
being released and pardoned after intense lobbying by
Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander Downer. They too
had been convicted in a closed court.
Kay Danes says this about the Australian Government's
position on Noorpolat Abdulla.
KAY DANES: He's got like the trifecta. He's been
labelled a terrorist, he's a Muslim and he's non-Anglo
Saxon.
MICHAEL VINCENT: The Australian Government says it
treats all of its cases equally.
Bruce Billson.
BRUCE BILLSON: There's about 200 Australian citizens
in jails overseas at this time. We take every one of
those individuals' cases very seriously.
MICHAEL VINCENT: The Australian Government also says
it's supporting a family appeal for clemency.
BRUCE BILLSON: They've sought clemency. We've
supported that clemency application. That's yet to be
determined by the Kazakhstan authorities and we are
following through, encouraging a favourable
consideration.
MICHAEL VINCENT: But this is news to the Abdulla
family, as the Government has failed to tell them, or
his lawyer about this development.
Meanwhile, it's been a lonely wait for Rabiya Abdulla
and her children. She had a second son not long after
her husband was arrested.
RABIYA ABDULLA: I can't say to them that their father
is in prison because they are not old enough to
understand the political situation.
MICHAEL VINCENT: You can't bring yourself to tell them?
RABIYA ABDULLA: No I can't. I can't.
MARK COLVIN: Rabiya Abdulla, the wife of Noorpolat
Abdulla, an Australian convicted of terrorism in
Kazakhstan. Michael Vincent was the reporter there..
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2004/s1244172.htm
|
