Hero’s welcome as Hakeem al-Araibi home after being freed from Thai jail

The refugee at the centre of a diplomatic wrangle is home safe in Australia after spending two months in a Thai jail.

Footballer Hakeem al-Araibi speaks to the media beside ex-Socceroos captain Craig Foster upon his arrival at the airport in Melbourne. Picture: AFP

Bahraini Australian footballer and refugee Hakeem al-Araibi has arrived at Melbourne Airport to a crowd of well-wishers after spending 11 weeks in a Bangkok jail, thanking Australians for intervening and declaring that although he is yet to become a citizen, he considers himself Australian.

Fellow professional footballers, unionists and refugee activists were all present to give the 25-year-old a hero’s welcome.

An overwhelmed Mr Araibi just wanted a few things: to thank Australia, see his wife, and finally, assure football fans he was fit to play.

“It’s amazing to see all the people here,” he said.

“The Australian people and the media have supported me and I just want to thank the Australian government, the Australian people, human rights (campaigners).

“I will be more strong for this. I will be strong just for Australia.

“Australia is my country. I don’t have citizenship yet, but my country is Australia. I love Australia. Thank you very much.”

Former Socceroos captain Craig Foster, who led the international campaign to have Mr Araibi freed, said he was reunited with his wife privately after facing media at the airport.

He just wanted to see his wife, “but the second thing that he spoke about was his fitness”, Foster said.

“He said, ‘I’m in good condition’ and he wants to go and play, and I said, ‘What’s that shirt?’ and he said ‘this is my Pascoe Vale shirt, but I feel strong, Craig’ he said. ‘I feel strong. I’ve been training in prison.’

“That’s how much he loves the game, and then he wanted to know, ‘are my teammates here?’”

He said Mr Araibi’s wife was thankful to have her husband back.

“Like Hakeem, she just keeps saying ‘thank you Australia, thank you to the Prime Minister, thank you Australia, Australia is an amazing place and we can’t believe everyone has fought for us’, exactly what Hakeem has been saying,” he said.

Mr Araibi was yesterday released from a Bangkok remand centre at 4pm local time (AEST 8pm) after Bahrain withdrew its request to have him extradited back to the country he fled in 2014 after being arrested and tortured for participating in pro-democracy activities.

Thai authorities had detained the Melburnian, who holds an Australian protection visa, after Bahrain alerted them that he had travelled to Thailand on his honeymoon.

Hakeem al-Araibi just after arriving at Melbourne Airport today. Picture: Scott Barbour/Getty

Last night, news of his impending release spread quickly after the Thai Attorney-General’s office confirmed it had asked the Bangkok Criminal Court to end the ­extradition process.

Chatchom Akapin, director-general of the international ­affairs department of the ­Attorney-General’s office, confirmed to The Australian that the Bangkok Criminal Court had approved a motion to withdraw the original extradition request, filed on behalf of the Bahrain government earlier this month. “He is going to be released today because he is a free man,” he said. “He can go anywhere he likes, Australia or anywhere.”

Foster’s thanks

Mr Foster thanked all those responsible for Mr Araibi’s release.

“Something of this magnitude doesn’t happen without an incredible team behind, and there’s been an amazing coalition of people right from around the world, but particularly I’m very proud of Australia, I’m very proud today to be Australian,” he said.

“I think what’s occurred over the past almost three months to fight incredibly hard for not just a young player who virtually no one knew, but a refugee who was under our protection and who we felt that all of us needed to step forward and protect, to see him back here on home soil today speaks volumes about the character, the values, and the pride that we have as Australians.

He thanked football bodies including Professional Footballers Australia and FIFA, as well as Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Foreign Minister Marise Payne.

The SBS broadcaster also paid tribute to Ambassador-Designate Alan McKinnon and his staff at Australia’s embassy in Bangkok.

“They’ve kept us fully briefed … to make sure that whilst our advocacy was of the most robust nature, and it had to be … at the same time, were very consistent and very careful in our public messaging,” he said.

“We were really concerned that anything we said or did could be counter-productive to seeing what we’ve seen today, which is a young Australian reunited with his wife.

Mr Foster said Mr Araibi’s case had raised issues including refugee and international law, Australia’s policies, and international sport governance.

“The next stage of this campaign is to start to clean-up some of the sport’s governance that played a role in bringing this about, and that ultimately put Hakeem in jail back in 2012 and saw him tortured, and we’re not going to stop until we hold people accountable for what’s occurred over the last three months,” he said.

Reunion with wife

Mr Foster said that above all else, Mr Araibi’s return was about “a young man getting back to his wife”.

“She hasn’t seen him for nearly three months,” he said. “He’s been locked up in detention, unable to speak to her.

“As Hakeem said here before, this young family has incredible, extraordinary gratitude for what Australia has done for them.

“They now recognise, like everyone else around the world, that Australia is and can be an incredibly special place.

“I’m sure Hakeem will shortly become a citizen, the last few months has only solidified, in our mind, what Australia is capable of when we put the right principles ahead of where we’re going, when we fight for what is right and we do it together as a country, we’re pretty special.”

The former Socceroo called for a “thorough investigation” into the role of the Australian Federal Police and what it knew about the Bahraini red notice issued through Interpol for Mr Araibi’s arrest.

“As the public, we need to be completely confident that the processes have been followed,” Mr Foster said.

“We need to make sure that the system is going to be changed.”

Pascoe Vale Football Club chairman Lou Tona paid tribute to Mr Foster for his “unbelievable personal sacrifice”, saying it was a proud day to be an Australian.

Amnesty International Australia spokeswoman Diana Sayed thanked all those who had campaigned to bring Mr Araibi home and said its was important to remember “there are other Bahrainis who remain in detention today in Bahrain and we have to maintain the fight”.

ACTU Secretary Sally McManus said the trade union movement had been mobilising since late last year to bring Mr Araibi home. “He’s one of us. Not just an Australian, but a union member,” Ms McManus said, in reference to Mr Araibi’s membership of Professional Footballers Australia.

Mr Araibi after his last court appearance while jailed in Thailand. Picture: Sakchai Lalit/AP

‘No reason for us to keep him’

On Monday, Mr Chatchom said the ­Attorney-General’s office lodged the motion to stop the extradition process after receiving a letter from the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday morning. “The situation has changed from the day we submitted the request … most importantly, we received news from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that the government of Bahrain wishes to withdraw the request for extradition. Bahrain no longer wants him so there is no reason for us to keep him.”

Mr Araibi had been in Thai custody on an erroneously issued ­Interpol red notice — in contravention of international law protecting refugees against refoulement — since November 27 when he and his wife arrived in Bangkok for a delayed honeymoon. His case sparked an inter­national campaign over fears he would face imprisonment, torture and even death if he were extradited to Bahrain, where he was convicted in absentia and sentenced to 10 years’ jail on a vandalism charge he strongly denies.

His last court appearance last Monday, at which he arrived in leg shackles, sparked outrage.

Last night, Fatima Yazbek from the Gulf Institute for Democracy and Human Rights, an Australia-based organisation that has been helping with the campaign, said Mr Araibi’s wife was “going crazy” with relief since she heard he was to be freed.

“She’s so happy. Earlier, when the news was not confirmed and she didn’t know what was happening, she just started praying,” she said. “I have heard that the Professional Footballers Association are planning to go and welcome Hakeem at the airport as a hero.”

Evan Jones from the Asia-­Pacific Refugee Rights Centre said such a decision represented “a win for human rights and refugee protection”. “Such action should be ­applauded and Thailand given due recognition,” he said.

Thai prosecutors also expressed their relief. Mr Chatchom said Bahrain’s decision to withdraw the request was “a good way out” for everyone.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said Mr Araibi’s return was “great news”.

“I want to say to Craig Foster and everybody who’s been involved in just getting the right outcome here, this is the right thing to do, the fair thing to do,” Mr Andrews said.

“He’s a fantastic young person, someone who got caught up in just a very difficult set of circumstances: bogus charges levied against him.

“We’re very pleased that governments have been able to work together, and to Craig and all of his team, and I think every single Victorian, who knows and understands that his story is one that we should all share in, and I know that Pascoe Vale Football Club will be delighted to have him back.”