Rights of Mehul Choksi will be respected, says Dominican Prime Minister

A new layer was added to the Mehul Choksi saga after Dominican Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit declared in a statement that the fugitive diamantaire’s rights will be respected and the courts will decide on the next course of action.

“His rights will be respected as has been done thus far and let the court decide what will happen,” Skerrit said in a press statement.

Skeritt also stated that so far that no issues have cropped up in regards to the fugitive Choksi as the matter is between India and Antigua.

“We have no issues insofar as the matter relates to Antigua and or India, we are part of our own community and we must recognize our duties and responsibilities in this regard,” he added.

Calling Choksi an “Indian citizen” Skerrit reiterated that the court will decide the next course of action for Choksi and that he does not like to get involved by making public statements in such matters.

“The matter with this Indian citizen is before the courts, the courts will decide what happens to the gentleman and we will allow the court process to go through, I do not like to get involved by making public statements in these matters,” Skerrit said.

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Choksi had gone missing from Antigua on May 23 after going out for a walk and was caught in Dominica. While the Antiguan Prime Minister repeatedly insisted that Choksi fled to Dominica with his girlfriend, the diamantaire's wife Priti Choksi and lawyers alleged he was abducted by Antiguan and Indian officers, tortured and ferried off to Dominica in a boat. He has been charged for illegal entry in Dominica and is being treated at a hospital there after a court has adjourned the matter to June 14.

Skerrit himself has come under fire from his country’s opposition. He was accused of adding to “Dominica's deteriorating international image”

"The presence of Indian born Antigua and Barbuda citizen Mehul Choksi in Dominica following allegations that he was kidnapped in Antigua, beaten, ferried to Dominica and taken into the country against his will, highlights once again the extent to which departments of government are involved in organised crime under the influence and/or direction of the regime of Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit," the opposition leader Lennox Linton told ANI.