UAE Sheik to be tried for Torture

Trouble in Sharialand.

You would think that torture that makes waterboarding look like picnic, committed by a UAE sheik, would get some media play. Especially considering the UAE is considered to be an ally, nearly given control of our ports.

As a trusted adviser to a member of the ruling family of the United Arab Emirates, Texas businessman Bassam Nabulsi says he safeguarded the sheik's most important documents: financial records, investment documents, and videotapes showing the sheik torturing people with a cattle prod and a spiked plank.

When the business relationship began to deteriorate, Nabulsi says, he also was imprisoned for months and tortured by jailers trying to get the tapes back.

Now, the tapes could become evidence in a federal lawsuit against Sheik Issa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a son of the late UAE president and brother of Abu Dhabi's crown prince. By custom, a member of the Al Nahyan royal family serves as president of the UAE.

The lawsuit and the tapes could prove embarrassing to the UAE, a U.S. ally that promotes itself as a pro-Western nation catering to business travelers and tourists.

The tapes have not been made public but The Associated Press viewed 11 still frames from one of the videos. They showed a man who appeared to be Sheik Issa beating another man with lumber, firing an automatic weapon into the sand around him and forcing an apparent cattle prod into his anus. The victim also appeared to have been partly run over by a SUV and had salt poured on his wounds.

Here is a highly graphic video of Shiek Issa torturing his business partner, from the UAE Torture website.