Alkarama submitted his case to the Special Rapporteur on Torture on 24 December 2009 asking him to intervene with the Yemeni authorities.

Abdelghani Ahmed Hussein Suleiman, a 38 year old teacher is a Pakistani citizen. He was born in Saudi Arabia, where he has always lived, and is married to a Yemeni national who also lived in Saudi Arabia and with whom he has three children.

After his arrest by Saudi authorities without any legal ground, he was held there incommunicado for two months before being forcibly extradited in August 2007 to Pakistan, his country of origin, however with which he has no ties.

His wife was then deported with her children to Yemen, two months after her husband's extradition.

In mid-April 2008, Mr Suleiman went to Yemen on a tourist visa to see his wife and children, effectively trying to resolve his family's predicament.

On the evening of 28 April 2008 he was arrested on the street and taken away in a vehicle belonging to the Political Security services. Four hours later, he was returned to his homestead with his hands cuffed behind his back, accompanied by agents who conducted a warrantless search of his home.

He was then taken to an unknown location and no news of his whereabouts has given rise for over two months. It was only because of an ex-detainee of Sana'a's Political Security detention center, that his whereabouts are known, although the authorities deny holding him. In addition to this, Mr Suleiman has never been formally charged, nor has been given legal counsel.

After 20 months of incommunicado detention at Sana'a's Political Security detention center, Mr Suleiman was transferred on 21 December 2009 to the refugee detention center in Bir Abid, Sana'a where inmates are usually foreign nationals awaiting deportation or deportation to Pakistan.

His family is particularly concerned because torture is commonplace in Pakistan and because many of those who have been forcibly returned to Pakistan have been victims of arbitrary arrests, incommunicado detention and torture.

Alkarama had already submitted Mr Suleiman's case to the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on 3 December 2008 in order for it to consider his detention as arbitrary.

We recall that the Committee against Torture, during its periodic review on 3 November 2009, recently evaluated Yemen and noted in its Concluding Observations that prisoners should have the right to be informed of their rights when arrested, including the charges against them, and to appear before a judge in compliance with international standards.

The UN body also recommends that the Yemeni authorities ensure compliance with Article 3 of the Convention which forbids extradition or deportation to countries practicing torture. In this sense, experts advise the state to carefully consider each individual case and to ensure the implementation of adequate judicial mechanisms when reexamining their decisions.