'Confident' of getting answers regarding Rilwan's disappearance: Suood

The presidential inquiry commission into deaths and disappearances is confident about getting answers to the disappearance of journalist Ahmed Rilwan, commission president Husnu Suood has said.

Suood said as such in a tweet on Saturday, expressing that he is ‘happy to be doing what he is doing’.

The ‘Commission on Investigation of Murder and Enforced Disappearances’ announced in late December that the investigation for all their current cases will be completed by April.

The commission is investigating 25 cases in total, and have enlisted the assistance of experts for footage analysis. Experts with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, specializing in longterm cases, audio-visual investigation, and forensics, are also assisting the commission.

Rilwan was last seen purchasing a ticket to Hulhumalé at the ferry terminal in capital city Malé on August 8th, 2014. The police arrested four suspects in September. The Cirminal Court had then released one suspect and placed another under house arrest.

In October of that year, Home Minister Umar Naseer said that local street gangs may have been behind Rilwan’s disappearance. An Al Jazeera exposé later revealed that Naseer was instructed not be ‘overwhelmed’ with the case, by then president Abdulla Yameen.

On August 2nd last year, the Cirminal Court acquitted two individuals accused of terrorism in conspiring to abduct Rilwan. Presiding Judge Adam Arif said there is no sufficient evidence to convict the defendants, Aalif Rauf and Mohamed Nooradheen, of being ‘involved with a network of several people’ in Rilwan’s abduction.

While the court acquitted the two men, the slow-moving proceedings have been heavily criticized. Human rights activist and prominent lawyers have expressed concern about the investigation and trial, describing them as incomplete and false.

Rauf and Nooradheen were accused of forcing Rilwan into a car outside his apartment on the night of his disappearance, 8th August 2014. Efforts from his family and friends to pressure authorities into making the case a bigger priority have been suppressed.

A demonstration calling for justice in Rilwan’s disappearance and blogger Yameen Rasheed’s murder had been disbanded through force. Officers had arrested participants and confiscated signs, and used pepper spray and other riot-control tactics.

Rilwan’s brother, Moosa Rilwan, said in an interview on the day of the acquittal that they will ‘continue to seek justice, as long as it takes’.