Professor Cyril Karabus’s bid to return home to Cape Town has been dealt another blow.
|||Cape Town - Professor Cyril Karabus’s bid to return home to Cape Town has been dealt another blow.
A hearing today of an appeal by the prosecution against him being freed has been postponed to April 23, after the prosecution failed to bring a medical translator to court.
Karabus’s lawyer, Michael Bagraim, said the postponement appeared to be another delaying tactic.
Karabus, pictured, a UCT emeritus professor and retired paediatric oncologist, has not been allowed to leave the United Arab Emirates (UAE) since August. He was convicted in absentia of manslaughter, after the death of a Yemeni girl he treated while on locum in Abu Dhabi in 2002.
“It is beyond understanding. It wasn’t a case of the medical translator not being available or away, it was just a matter of them not bringing him to court,” he said.
“There simply is no legal basis for this appeal or for what they are doing. This is territory for a psychologist now, certainly not a lawyer.
“We simply do not understand if there was something that had upset them or whether they just do not like losing. We just do not know what is behind this.”
Bagraim said the process was hurting the UAE, because that country would find it increasingly difficult to get doctors to work there.
The
SA Medical Association (Sama) spoke of its shock after UAE prosecutors announced that they would appeal against the court decision to acquit Karabus on charges of manslaughter.
Dr Mzukisi Grootboom, the medical association’s chairman, said the UAE had moved from a travesty of justice to cruel and extreme punishment.
“The UAE has finally exposed its true intentions with this now seven-month farce - which are clearly not to let justice prevail.
“Professor Karabus was found not guilty and absolved of all charges, so what possibly could be the basis of any appeal other than just to inflict further suffering on an elderly and respected colleague?”
Sama has called on South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Co-operation to intensify diplomatic efforts to resolve this matter.
“The association will also take advantage of an opportunity to lead and reiterate its call for a global boycott of doctors and health personnel of the UAE and other countries violating the human rights of health-care workers,” Grootboom said.
natasha.bezuidenhout@inl.co.za
Cape Argus