The counsel of former President Mohamed Nasheed led by human rights activist Jared Genser, has urged the UN to restore his political rights, including the right to participate in this year’s presidential election.

A statement on Nasheed’s website said that the counsel made this plea in a 40-page brief responding to the Maldives government’s reply to the UN Human Rights Committee.

In the original submission, counsel to President Nasheed explained that his disqualifications from running for political office under the country’s Constitution and from holding a leadership position in a political party remain in effect.

In 2015, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found that President Nasheed’s arrest, conviction, sentence, and imprisonment on terrorism charges was arbitrary and in violation of international law. It concluded it was “impossible to invoke any legal basis justifying the deprivation of liberty of Mr. Nasheed.”

In a prior case, the Human Rights Committee found that if an underlying basis for a restriction on political participation is a conviction that is later found to be arbitrary that no such restriction would be objective or reasonable, thereby making it illegal and in violation of international law.

Jared Genser, on this submission commented, “I am very confident in our case and strongly believe the Human Rights Committee now has all the information it needs to determine that President Nasheed’s disqualification from The Maldives 2018 Presidential election would be a flagrant violation of its binding legal obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. When the Government loses, it will have to re-qualify President Nasheed or ensure that the international community will declare in advance of the vote that the election cannot be considered either free or fair.”

The Human Rights Committee, which consists of representatives of 20 countries that are a party to the treaty, is expected to consider Nasheed’s case soon.