Jordan criticised for jailing lawmakers

HUMAN Rights Watch criticised Jordan’s arrest of four lawmakers who visited the family of slain terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, calling it a violation of freedom of expression.

“Expressing condolences to the family of a dead man, however murderous he might be, is not a crime,” Sarah Leah Whitson, director of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East and North Africa division, said in a statement.

The lawmakers, members of Jordan’s largest opposition group, visited al-Zarqawi’s family home in Zarqa, 17 miles northeast of Amman, on June 9, two days after the al-Qaida leader in Iraq was killed in a US airstrike. One of the legislators, Mohammed Abu Fares, described al-Zarqawi as a “martyr”. Abu Fares and three others — Jaafar al-Hourani, Ali Abu Sukkar and Ibrahim al-Mashwakhi — were arrested two days later and charged with “instigating sectarian strike” and “fuelling national discord”. They remain jailed, serving 15-day detention orders.

Whitson said “a dubious comment about an alleged terrorist leader” should not be considered “incitement to violence.” “Going after these people is an unacceptable violation of their basic rights to free speech.”