A United Arab Emirates court has lifted a prison sentence but upheld a conviction on money laundering charges for US citizen and civil rights attorney Asim Ghafoor, who was detained while transiting through Dubai last month, the Judicial Department and a lawyer for Ghafoor said on Wednesday.
The court ordered Ghafoor to pay a 5 million dirham ($1.36 million) fine and for 18 million dirhams in his account to be confiscated. But it removed a three-year jail term from an earlier sentence handed down in absentia in May, lawyer Habib Al Mulla told Reuters.
The anti-money laundering and tax evasion court in Abu Dhabi also ordered Ghafoor to be deported, the emirate's Judicial Department said in a statement posted on its Twitter account. It confirmed the jail term had been removed and that Ghafoor faced the fine and confiscation of his funds.
The lawyer did not say whether Ghafoor, who is based in Virginia, had been released. The US Embassy in Abu Dhabi did not immediately respond to emailed requests for comment.
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