Dubai, October 18: According to lawyer Hussain Al Jaziri of Jaafar Alwan, Al Jaziri and Associates for Advocacy and Legal Consultancy, if a person has suspicion that he/she is being stalked by the same individual, he/she should immediately report the problem to the police without any hesitation.
If the person is subject to sudden attack for theft, molestation or any other motive, he/she has the right to protect oneself. As per the UAE law, self-defence is an acquired legitimate right if the attacker indeed gets into action, Al Jaziri said.
Asked whether the tenant could complain against the landlord if the building does not have a security guard, he said, “It depends on whether you have signed the tenancy contract while knowing that there is no watchman. In such a case, you can’t complain. However, if there used to be a security guard before and at the time of the tenancy contract signing and that guard ceased to be present after the contract was signed, then the tenant is absolutely entitled to complain. But relevant clauses should be stipulated in the agreement he already had with the landlord.”
Dr Reyadh Al Kabban of Al Kabban Advocates and Legal Consultants told Khaleej Times a person’s right to self-defence was protected by UAE law and several articles in the Penal Code address circumstances for self-defence.
Al Kabban said one can protect oneself if he/she believes he/she is threatened and there is no way to avoid the attacker or call for help.
However, any act of self-defence must be in proportion to the attack. Only in extreme circumstances, such as fearing an attacker might kill you or rape you, can a person kill somebody in self-defence. “We met with cases wherein, someone having a phobia of being chased, killed somebody for no reason,” Al Kabban said.
“In that case, the person is not using his right to self-defence legitimately and his act of killing would be subject to appropriate punishment. However, if a woman or a man comes under a rape threat and it is a hopeless case that someone could intervene to stop that threat, then the use of anything available that may be used as weapon to prevent that imminent rape is a legitimate act. A woman can stab her attacker if she was facing a rape threat,” Dr Al Kabban explained.
The punishment of a murder differs according to the circumstances of the case. If the element of premeditation is present, the crime could carry the maximum punishment, that is death penalty, he said.
–Agencies