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The Times

6 Oct, 10 tweets, 3 min read

The ruler of Dubai faces a police investigation after a judge concluded he ordered the hacking of Tory peer Baroness Shackleton’s mobile phone using Pegasus surveillance software, in order to monitor custody proceedings in relation to his two children thetimes.co.uk/article/sheikh…

The victims of the hack – believed to be in relation to the court proceedings over custody of their two children – were the prominent barrister and Conservative peer Baroness Shackleton of Belgravia, and Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein, the sheikh’s former wife.

The Pegasus spyware used in the case can record calls, copy messages and photographs and secretly film users.

It can also access address books, call records, calendars, emails and internet browsing histories.

The hack was exposed with the help of Cherie Blair, QC – the wife of former Labour prime minister Tony Blair – who is an adviser to the Israeli intelligence company behind Pegasus.

She alerted Shackleton in August last year.

Hours earlier Shackleton’s law firm had received a warning from human rights lawyer Martyn Day. He said a Canadian computer expert who was assisting a UAE activist who had been the victim of Pegasus had found evidence that the Shackleton’s law firm had also been targeted.

The sheikh had previously asked the Supreme Court to block the investigation into the allegations of hacking

An appeal to the Court of Appeal - one of numerous court hearings - cost £2.5million in legal fees.

Sir Andrew McFarlane, president of the family division of the High Court, concluded in judgments made public today there have been hacking and abuse of power by a head of government.

Mohammed has also been found to have attempted to buy a stately home in Surrey to intimidate his former wife who lived with their two young children in a neighbouring mansion.

The same judge from today’s ruling found Mohammed ordered the abduction of two of his daughters. Princess Latifa, 35, was seized from a yacht in the Indian Ocean in 2018 and her sister Princess Shamsa, then 19, disappeared in Cambridge in 2000.

The ruling will be greeted with dismay within Buckingham Palace

For years the Queen has been a friend of Mohammed, united by their love of racing. He has ridden with the Queen in her carriage at Royal Ascot and been a regular in the Royal Enclosure.

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