Nasheed’s wife summoned in police probe into ‘forged documents’

Jailed former President Mohamed Nasheed’s wife, Laila Ali, is to be questioned over the authenticity of a document relating to the opposition leader’s permanent transfer to house arrest.

The police summons was delivered this evening, and orders Laila to the police headquarters at 8:30pm on Friday.

It comes just hours after police raided Nasheed’s home and confiscated CCTV recording equipment.

The government claims the document publicized by Nasheed’s lawyers is forged, and has re-imprisoned the former president.

Nasheed’s Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) today condemned the police’s “blatant harassment” of his family.

The six-hour raid began at 9:40pm on Wednesday night, soon after Nasheed’s lawyers shared with the police CCTV footage of a government official who had delivered the disputed document on July 19.

Police said they were looking for an original of the document during last night’s raid.

The police today accused Nasheed’s family of failing to cooperate with investigations.

At a press conference this afternoon, Chief Superintendent Hamdhoon Rasheed said: “We went to obtain evidence in the case into the document handover. We are saddened by the family’s lack of cooperation with the investigation.”

Hamdhoon said police officers had requested the family to handover additional CCTV footage, but the family refused.

According to lawyers, Laila told police officers last night that the documents had been sent abroad for an independent forensic analysis.

Lawyers told The Maldives Independent that they refused to handover the hard disk because the court warrant issued to attain CCTV footage had expired by midnight and did not authorize the police to remove installed hardware.

The police had obtained four different court warrants last night.

MDP spokesperson Hamid Abdul Ghafoor said: “The Maldives regime goes from bad to worse. Having illegally sent President Nasheed back to jail, they are now targeting his family in an ugly campaign of harassment and intimidation.”

The MDP also expressed concern over riot police of Special Operations police officers entering Nasheed’s residence at 2:30am without a court warrant to remove journalists, who Laila had permitted to remain inside the premises.

Lawyers and MDP said several police officers had remained inside Nasheed’s home from 1:20am – 3:15am unlawfully.

The third court warrant had expired at 1am, and the fourth warrant only arrived at 3:15, lawyers said.

Nasheed’s re-imprisonment had led to renewed international calls for his release.

His terrorism conviction relates to the arrest of a judge during his tenure.

Laila in April filed a petition with the UN working group on arbitrary detention, requesting a ruling declaring Nasheed’s imprisonment arbitrary and illegal.

She has met with US Secretary of State John Kerry, British Prime Minister David Cameron, and the UN Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein in her campaign to free him.