Former Vice President Ahmed Adeeb has been returned to Maldives on Sunday night.

Officers escorted Adeeb to the police headquarters in Male’ at 10:15pm.

Adeeb was caught trying to escape to India by pretending to be crewman on a tugboat, which had managed to reach Tuticorin Old Port in Tamil Nadu.

Guernica 37 International Justice Chambers, the legal firm representing Adeeb, has said that “there is a very real and demonstrable risk that his fundamental rights and freedoms will be violated” if he is returned to Maldives and that he “is at risk of becoming a victim of a politically motivated justice system.”

While Adeeb sought asylum in India, the government denied him entry due to his lack of valid travel documents. The Maldives Immigration had earlier withheld his passport in accordance with a Supreme Court order.

The police service has searched Adeeb’s home over his escape attempt, to gather evidence.

While Adeeb’s prison sentences totaling 33 years have been overturned, the court ordered retrials in two cases, and the state appealed one of the verdicts which led to the confiscation of his passport.