UK Foreign Office 'apologises' for mishandling Matthew Hedges UAE torture case

The UK Foreign Office has apologised to a British citizen for how it handled his detention and torture in the United Arab Emirates by state security.

The office apologised to British academic Matthew Hedges in a letter signed by its top diplomat Philip Barton, and awarded him £1,500 in compensation. The office said it had failed to follow its own guidelines on how to look for signs of torture.

Hedges took to social platform X, formerly known as Twitter, to welcome the apology and compensation, and called the government's acknowledgement of the torture he suffered while in detention a "watershed moment".

"There is now no doubt that the FCDO failed in its obligations towards one of their citizens," Hedges said.

Hedges said he would continue to fight on behalf of other British nationals held and tortured by foreign governments, including activist Alaa Abdel-Fattah in Egypt.

He also questioned why the British government was continuing to maintain defence ties with the UAE considering its "callous" treatment of the lives of British citizens.

The foreign office apology came after the parliamentary ombudsman said last month that the British government should apologise to and compensate Hedges for failing to protect him from torture.

The ombudsman had found that British officials had failed to notice that Hedges was showing signs of having been tortured.

Hedges was arrested in May 2018 after flying in to Dubai airport in order to conduct research in the UAE.

The academic claimed that while in detention, he had been tortured, interrogated for up to 15 hours at a time, and forced to take drugs.

He was sentenced by a court to 25 years in jail for "spying for or on behalf of" the UK, but was later pardoned by the Emirati government.