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Manuel Guerrero Aviña, a Mexican national was arrested in Qatar, on February 4 for being a gay man and HIV positive, and received mistreatment and torture.

The Manuel Guerrero committee, created to campaign for his release, indicated that the Mexican “is flying free and with dignity to London”

Manuel Guerrero, a Mexican detained in Qatar supposedly for his sexual orientation, left the Arab country on Monday, August 12th “definitively and in total freedom” for London, after paying a fine following the sentence that condemned him for “drug possession,” reported family sources.

The Manuel Guerrero committee, created to campaign for his release, indicated on its official X account that Manuel “is flying free and with dignity to London,” where “he will spend a few days to receive medical attention” for the “torture” that the detainee and his family said he suffered in prison.

The Qatari Police arrested Guerrero on February 4 in Doha after attending a meeting arranged through the application ‘Grindr’ in which the Qatari authorities created a false profile and arrested him at the time of the meeting, according to the family.

Earlier this month, the judge published his decision confirming the sentence imposed on Guerrero, also a British citizen, in a hearing held on June 4, for “drug possession and other drug-related offenses,” charges that he and the family have denied.

Guerrero has maintained that he is innocent: “I continue to maintain my innocence and maintain that I was unjustly accused and convicted. The charges against me are unfounded, and this situation has been a serious violation of my human rights,” he said in a statement.

However, a Qatari official told the press last June, on condition of anonymity, that Guerrero Aviña “admitted to the possession of the seized substances and was subsequently booked, registered and presented before the court. Later, a drug test came back positive, confirming the presence of amphetamine and methamphetamine in Mr. Aviña’s system at the time of his arrest.”

The official accused the family of making “false accusations” about the reasons for the legal case.

Guerrero spent almost a month in jail, where he claimed he had to sign papers whose content he did not know, he was made to go more than a day without drinking water and he lacked access to his treatment for most of the time because he is a person living with HIV, the family claimed.

The case sparked the interest of activists, who created a campaign to attract the attention of the Mexican government, which initially refused to intervene because Guerrero had registered in Qatar as a British citizen.

However, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs finally agreed to intervene in the case, until the final verdict was reached.

TYT Newsroom