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A princess raced to escape Dubai’s powerful ruler. Then her phone appeared on the list.
In the days before commandos dragged Princess Latifa from her getaway yacht in the Indian Ocean, her number was added to a list that included targets of a powerful spyware, a new investigation shows. The princess had been careful, so she left her phone in the cafe’s bathroom. She’d seen what her father could do…
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How the FBI played a role in the capture of Princess Latifa of Dubai
On a yacht in the Indian Ocean, heavily armed commandos seized the princess. “Shoot me here! Don’t take me back!” Princess Latifa – whose full name is Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed al-Maktoum – screamed during the raid in March 2018 as the armed men bound her wrists. They had been sent by her father, the billionaire…
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Interview: ‘They told me they could do anything they wanted with me’ — Princess Latifa’s friend speaks out about trying to escape Dubai with the princess and the Irish connection
The last time Tiina Jauhiainen saw her close friend Princess Latifa of Dubai, she was being dragged away kicking and screaming by armed commandos from a boat off the Indian coast. Latifa and Tiina had mounted a daring escape from the gulf state in February 2018 after the princess had her freedom heavily restricted by…
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Stark light shone on Latifa’s father, a big player in Irish horse racing
The woman who helped Princess Latifa in her attempt to escape from Dubai has called on Irish horseracing authorities to ban Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum from the sport. Princess Latifa’s friend Tiina Jauhiainen said it is time for Irish racing to take a stand on the ruler of the gulf state over his…
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Abducted, kidnapped, escaped: the ugly tale of Dubai’s princesses
It’s the stuff of a dark fairy story: imprisoned daughters, a runaway bride and an overbearing father. Recent headlines about the family of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum have sent shockwaves around the world – and there’s no happy ending in sight. Martin Fletcher investigates. As a child Marcus Essabri used to play with his…
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The Middle East’s Progressive Darling Abuses Its Women
In a series of recently released videos, Latifa Al Maktoum, a Dubai princess who was missing for more than a year, recounted her harrowing capture by around a dozen commandos who raided a boat she was sailing 30 miles off the coast of India. After a struggle, one tranquilized her, and she fell unconscious. The…
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Godolphin stables Sheik ‘should be banned from Melbourne Cup and Everests’, activists demand
The ruler of Dubai should not be allowed to race in the Melbourne Cup or Sydney’s Everest after his daughter claimed she was being kept hostage, human rights activists say. Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, Dubai’s Prime Minister and owner of Godolphin stables, has been under pressure since his daughter Princess Latifa smuggled out a…
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Elaine Byrne: Robinson should have known better on the plight of Princess Latifa
“As a woman, I want women who have felt themselves outside history to be written back into history.” So said Mary Robinson in her famous “Mná na hÉireann” speech in 1990, when she became Ireland’s first female president. That historic speech is very much at odds with Robinson’s extraordinary lack of curiosity around the wellbeing…
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Gangsters’ paradise – Dubai’s finely spun web starts to unravel
His finely spun web has entangled the former Irish president, Mary Robinson, his estranged wife Princess Haya and the blue-bloods of the Irish Turf who tapped him for more than €5m for the redevelopment of the Curragh Racecourse. Dubai, his middle-eastern emirate, also harbours Christy Kinahan, head of the notorious drugs cartel. And it is…
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Justine McCarthy: Mary Robinson must lead on search for missing Princess Latifa
For those of us who celebrated Mary Robinson’s election as Ireland’s first woman president in 1990 the vapour trails of euphoria lingered long after she had left Aras an Uachtarain seven years later. She was a feminist who did not just talk the talk; she had walked the walk to Leinster House and the Four…