Amnesty demands retrial of girl convicted of spying

Amnesty International (AI) has demanded that authorities in Somaliland release or order the retrial of Zamzam Ahmed Dualeh, a 16-year-old girl accused of spying and sentenced to five years in prison in a trial described by the watchdog group as unfair.

"Amnesty International considers that her trial was grossly unfair and produced no evidence to substantiate the serious charge of espionage affecting the security of the state," AI said in a statement issued on Friday. "The judge summarily dismissed her allegations that she had been raped by six police officers and tortured."

Zamzam was sent to jail on 15 December after being convicted of "procuring information regarding the security of the state" and "making a false statement to police about her identity". Her co-defendant, Omar Jama Warsame, a taxi-driver who was arrested and charged with her, was acquitted.

According to AI, the two were arrested on 15 August at the residence of Vice President Yusuf Yasin in Hargeysa, the capital of the self-declared republic of Somaliland.

Zamzam said she arrived at the vice president's home by mistake when she was looking for the residence of a deputy minister she claims to be her relative.

AI said that Zamzam had been left to represent herself at both the start and the end of her trial. Local human rights defenders had arranged for four lawyers to defend her, but after they asked the judge to withdraw from the case as a result of alleged bias, the judge jailed all the lawyers for four years for "insulting the judge".

They were freed by appeal on 11 December, when their sentences were reduced to a one-year imprisonment or a fine, which they paid.

AI said Zamzam had been tried as an adult despite the fact that her identity card specified her age as 16 years, thus a child under the internationally recognised limit of 18 years. The court said she was 17.