ASIR: Relatives of a Jordanian who was killed last week during an alleged car chase with the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Hai'a) in Ahad Rufaidah have turned to the National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) for help. According to Al-Watan Arabic daily, an official at the NSHR said the family of Hassan Nabil has lodged a complaint with the organization in which they accuse the Hai'a of complicity in his death. A brother of Nabil told Al-Watan that family “wants to find out the truth” and said that they had refused to take possession of Hassan's body until “all the facts of the case have been properly investigated and the cause of his death established”. Reports stated that the 28-year-old Jordanian was pursued and detained by the Hai'a at the end of last week. He was forced to have a hair cut, and sometime later was admitted to hospital suffering from head injuries. Awad Al-Asmari, the official spokesman for the Hai'a in Asir, issued a statement Wednesday saying that that incident was being investigated by the relevant authorities. “The deceased was one of two persons reported by members of the public for harassing girls in front of a school,” he said. “One elderly person complained to the Hai'a claiming that the deceased and his companion had tried to harass his daughters and that when he intervened they attacked him, threw him on the ground and took his walking stick.” Al-Asmari did not state the time or place of the incident nor address the alleged car chase involving a member of the Hai'a, saying only that Nabil was “released from the Hai'a office and no action was taken against him”. He said, however, that Nabil appeared to be suffering from asthma at the time. “He looked pale, but when he was offered help to get him to hospital he turned it down,” he said. “He left with the legal guardian of his companion.”
