The director of the campaign group Cage was detained in Paris for almost 24 hours last week and then sent back to London after the French government accused him of spreading conspiracy theories about “Islamophobic persecution”.
In 2020 Cage, which campaigns on behalf of communities affected by the “war on terror”, overturned a French travel ban for its director, Muhammad Rabbani. But on arrival in Paris last Tuesday for meetings with French journalists and civil society leaders, Rabbani was told the interior ministry had imposed a new travel ban preventing him from entering the country. He was questioned and then sent back on a flight to London.
His treatment came days after widespread rioting in France after the fatal police shooting of Nahel Merzouk, a French 17-year-old of Moroccan and Algerian descent.
The French interior ministry set out the reasons for the ban in a document dated 31 October 2022. It said: “Given the particularly high terrorist threat, his presence on national territory would constitute a serious threat to public order and the internal security of France.”
The ban was imposed a month after Rabbani criticised the French government for “terrorising” its Muslim community in what he said was a “racist government agenda”. During a meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in Poland, in September 2022, Rabbani also accused France of joining China and India in launching “religious persecution” against Muslims.
In its travel ban France accused Rabbani of being part of a “radical Islamist movement” and “spreading slanderous words” about “supposed ‘Islamophobic persecution’ and mass surveillance by western governments, including France”.
It also accused Cage of helping to radicalise Mohammed Emwazi, the Islamic State terrorist known as “Jihadi John”, who was responsible for decapitating western hostages held by the terror group. Cage strenuously denies the claim.
The ban cited Rabbani’s conviction in the UK for refusing to disclose his mobile phone passcode when he was stopped in 2017 under schedule 7 of Terrorism Act 2000.
Cage said Rabbani spent almost 24 hours in French custody last week. It said he was also sent to a migrant detention centre from where he recorded a video about his treatment. Cage said French police questioned him both at the airport and at the detention centre. He was also questioned by an official from the interior ministry, it said.
Cage described the ban as “totally absurd” and an example of “authoritarian overreach”. Rabbani said: “France has banned me for delivering a speech at the OSCE conference – the world’s largest regional security intergovernmental organisation – exposing the systematic obstruction policy – a maximum repressive policing strategy that overwhelmingly targets Muslims – in September last year.
“The French government is clearly threatened by an NGO holding them to account. Our interventions and critiques are echoed across the board. Singling out a Muslim human rights defender for a ban smacks of the very same Islamophobia they are so offended to being accused of.”
