Djibouti: soldiers show support for detained pilot Fouad Youssouf Ali

View of a street in the city of Djibouti in 2016 (illustration image). Flickr.com CC BY 2.0 Francisco Anzola

Text by: RFI Follow

Fouad Youssouf Ali, this Djiboutian deserter pilot, is accused of treason and faces life in prison. This affair is causing a grumbling movement in the country. Several soldiers displayed their support for the lieutenant.

Publicity

Read more

With our regional correspondent in Nairobi , Sébastien Németh

Monday evening in Djibouti-ville, demonstrators demanded the release of Fouad Youssouf Ali . The grumbling continues two months after the pilot's incarceration. “  With a trigger, we know how it can end. There is a risk of instability with this blinded regime which uses force  ”, denounces the opponent Abdourahman Mohamed Guelleh.

"  Djibouti is the most stable country in the region and we are in a state of law  ", retorts Daoud Houmed, spokesman for the majority.

Fouad Youssouf Ali's wife released a video implying that the government had voluntarily introduced Covid-19 into the prison. "  There are no cases in Gabode and more than 200 detainees have been released to relieve congestion,  " replied Daoud Houmed.

Threat to resume hunger strike

The pilot has in any case stopped his hunger strike , but he could resume it, says his lawyer. "  I'm trying to dissuade him. But his health is deteriorating  ”, explains Mr. Zacharia Abdullahi, who should next week file a new request for provisional release, or urgent hospitalization. “  My client has also been visited by emissaries promising to be rehabilitated if he requests the demonstrations to be stopped. These are lies,  ”he says. In any case according to a good source, an interrogation of the lieutenant would be planned in the coming days.

Finally Deka Issa Douhour, corporal of the Republican guard who had announced his resignation in support of the deserter, has been detained since June 12. According to a good source, she had violated her duty of reserve and would risk disciplinary action. In a video Tuesday, his father Issa Douhour Hersi, a former gendarme, implored President Ismaël Omar Guelleh to release his daughter.

Newsletter Receive all international news directly in your mailbox

I subscribe

Follow all international news by downloading the RFI application

google-play-badge_FR

  • Djibouti

On the same subject

Djibouti: pilot Fouad Youssouf Ali on hunger strike at Gabode prison

Djibouti: tensions over the detention of lieutenant Fouad Youssouf Ali

Djiboutian officer missing in Ethiopia: he denounces his conditions of detention in Djibouti