Zeynab Javadli and her three young daughters, HRH Sheikha Sana, HRH Sheikha Asiya and HRH Sheikha Salma, were taken from their home in a night-time raid on 2 June 2026. Her mother, her family, her lawyers and the Azerbaijani Consulate did not know where they were, and no one in authority in Dubai would give a single answer. Zeynab has since been released on police bail, but she is not free: thrown out of her home, held with her mother in what her lawyers describe as arbitrary detention, unable to leave Dubai, her daughters still not returned to her. In truth she has been held in effective arbitrary detention in Dubai since 2021. For Zeynab, Dubai is a prison. This is how she got here.
Her story
It began as a love story. Zeynab Javadli, now 34, an Azerbaijani world-championship rhythmic gymnast who won medals at both the World and European championships, fell in love with an Olympian: Sheikh Saeed bin Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum, a businessman and former Olympic clay shooter, now 49, and nephew of Dubai's ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. They married in 2015 and had three daughters.
When the marriage broke down in 2019, everything changed. Sheikh Saeed divorced Zeynab by copying her into an email. Under the UAE's own default position, and under Shariah law, the children should have remained with their mother, and a Dubai court first granted Zeynab custody of her daughters. Then, following a change of judges, that arrangement was overturned by order of the Dubai courts. Zeynab and her lawyers say the ruling was the product of undue influence, court corruption and the power Sheikh Saeed wields as a senior member of the ruling family; a submission to the United Nations later described the custody proceedings as "neither independent nor impartial." Zeynab was told she could leave Dubai, but only without her girls. She refused.
From that moment she was subjected to relentless abuse: attacks on her home, threats of arrest, and travel bans, first on the children and then on Zeynab herself, that made her, in every meaningful sense, a hostage in her own home, a home given to her by Sheikh Mohammed himself. Her lawyer, David Haigh, says that in October 2025 Sheikh Saeed took the daughters and held them against their will for forty days.
In October 2020, state security, Dubai police and plain-clothes officers came to her home to forcibly take Zeynab's children. Zeynab livestreamed the raid on Instagram, a desperate, real-time plea that drew worldwide media attention, including an exclusive in the Daily Mail. Dubai's answer was an arrest warrant, issued for "damaging the reputation" of the emirate, and the deletion and blocking of her social-media accounts.
In 2022, her lawyers David Haigh and King's Counsel Rodney Dixon filed a formal complaint to the United Nations. Together with a damning BBC investigation into her treatment, it forced Dubai to the table. Presumably wary of the spotlight at a time when Dubai's treatment of its royal women was making international headlines in the cases of Princess Haya, Princess Latifa and Sheikha Shamsa, Dubai halted the removal of Zeynab's children. Its ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, personally intervened: Zeynab would keep custody of her daughters until they turned eighteen, along with a home, a driver and financial support, and his personal assurance that she and the girls would be safe. In return, she withdrew her UN complaint and stayed silent.
The peace did not hold. The abuse escalated again in late 2022, and it culminated when, Haigh says, Sheikh Saeed told the couple's eldest daughter, then just eight years old, during a visit that she was "a woman now" and ready to be married. Zeynab would not stand by. She never stopped fighting, for her rights as a woman and a mother, and to shield her daughter from the prospect of underage marriage.
Court papers made public in November 2025 set out her case: that Sheikh Saeed had caused the girls distress and harm. His answer was that she wished to keep the children from him in order to "instil Western behaviour that does not befit Muslims, citizens of the UAE, and members of the Ruling Family in particular." From that November, Haigh says, Zeynab was "held hostage in her own home, too terrified to step outside for fear of arrest under warrants and travel bans."
What has happened
On 10 April 2026, Zeynab lost her final custody appeal. The Dubai court ordered that the girls be returned to Sheikh Saeed and that "coercive force may be used if necessary." When she refused to hand over daughters who had lived with her their whole lives, and of whom the Dubai ruler himself had once granted her custody, arrest warrants were issued against her. Once more she livestreamed officers massing outside her home, and issued direct pleas to the President of Azerbaijan, the world's media and the United Nations.
We believe that in the middle of the night on Tuesday 2 June 2026, forces acting on behalf of the Dubai authorities attacked Zeynab's home and took her and her three children. The family's dog, Milky, has not been seen since. David Haigh last spoke to her that evening. For nearly two days there was no word, and for weeks afterwards her whereabouts were hidden from her own family.
Her elderly mother boarded a plane and flew to Dubai, because that is what mothers do. She was detained on arrival at the airport, then finally allowed to enter. She went straight to her daughter's home. The locks had been changed. The house was empty. And that elderly, unwell woman, the grandmother of three Dubai princesses, was left standing on the pavement outside in the blistering heat, with nowhere to go and no idea whether her daughter and grandchildren were alive.
On 6 June, Dubai's media office claimed Zeynab had been granted bail. It was false. She remained missing, held incommunicado, while her friends and family conducted harrowing searches across Dubai. Only after days of international pressure did Dubai Public Prosecution issue a statement confirming that she was in custody, still denied access to her lawyers, her consulate and her family, while her mother made a public video plea for any word that her daughter was alive.
Where it stands now
On 10 June 2026, after eight days in detention, Zeynab was released on police bail. But she is not free. She has been charged with kidnapping her own children, with two offences of cybercrime for the Instagram posts in which she begged the world to help save her life and the lives of her daughters, and with a further 14 criminal complaints for simply seeking to protect her children. She is held in Dubai under a travel ban that prevents her leaving the emirate, and her three daughters have not been returned to her. Dubai Watch and her legal team, including King's Counsel Rodney Dixon, continue to press the United Nations, the Azerbaijani government and the international community for the return of her children and for her freedom to leave Dubai.
That a mother can be prosecuted for cybercrime because she livestreamed a police raid and posted online pleas for help is an assault on free expression itself. Zeynab's "offence" was to speak, to ask the world for help when every official door had closed. Criminalising that plea answers none of the questions about where her daughters are or why they were taken; it only proves why she was right to be afraid, and why silence was never going to keep her safe.
Timeline
Sheikh Saeed divorces Zeynab, copying her into an email. Travel bans follow, first on the children, then on Zeynab. By order of the Dubai courts, the default position that the children remain with their mother is overturned, and the abuse and threats begin.
State security and plain-clothes Dubai police raid her home to seize her children. Zeynab livestreams it on Instagram; the footage draws global attention and a Daily Mail exclusive. Dubai issues an arrest warrant for "damaging the reputation" of the emirate and her accounts are blocked.
Her lawyers David Haigh and Rodney Dixon KC file a complaint to the United Nations. Alongside a damning BBC investigation, and amid international headlines over Princess Haya, Princess Latifa and Sheikha Shamsa, Dubai halts the removal of her children and negotiates: custody until eighteen, a home, a driver and protection, in exchange for her silence and the withdrawal of the UN complaint.
The truce frays. The abuse escalates again.
The truce collapses after Sheikh Saeed, Haigh says, tells the couple's eldest daughter, then eight, that she is "a woman now" and ready to be married. Zeynab resumes her fight.
Sheikh Saeed takes the three girls and holds them against their will for forty days.
Court papers setting out her case are made public. From this point Zeynab is, in her lawyer's words, "held hostage in her own home, too terrified to step outside for fear of arrest under warrants and travel bans."
Zeynab loses her final custody appeal. The court orders the girls returned to Sheikh Saeed and that "coercive force may be used if necessary." When she refuses to hand them over, arrest warrants are issued against her. She livestreams officers massing outside her home and pleads to the President of Azerbaijan, the world's media and the United Nations.
In a night-time raid, Zeynab and her three daughters are taken; the family dog, Milky, disappears. Her last contact is that evening.
All communication has ceased. David Haigh issues an urgent plea for international intervention. King's Counsel Rodney Dixon is instructed before the United Nations.
Zeynab's mother is detained at Dubai Airport, then admitted, and finds the family home empty with the locks changed.
Dubai's media office falsely claims Zeynab has been granted bail. In fact she remains missing and held incommunicado; her friends and family search Dubai for her. Only after days of pressure does Dubai Public Prosecution confirm she is in custody.
Zeynab is released on police bail after eight days in detention, but charged with kidnapping her own children, two counts of cybercrime, and 14 further criminal complaints.
Zeynab remains in Dubai under a travel ban, unable to leave, the charges still hanging over her. Her three daughters have not been returned to her.
What we're doing
David Haigh has stood by Zeynab for many years and spoke with her many times a day. Dubai Watch is instructing King's Counsel before the United Nations; calling on the international community, the media, human rights organisations, the worldwide athletics community and the Azerbaijani Government to demand answers; and placing Zeynab's case in the pattern Dubai works so hard to conceal, the cases of Sheikha Latifa, Sheikha Shamsa, Sheikha Bouchra and Princess Haya.
In the news
Coverage compiled by Dubai Watch. Outlets are linked for reference; inclusion does not imply endorsement. Journalists: press@dubaiwatch.org.
What you can do
In cases like this, silence is complicity and noise saves lives.
- Share this and say her name. Post, repost, and tag your government. #ZeynabJavadli #FreeZeynab #JusticeForZeynab
- Follow and amplify Zeynab directly. Instagram @zeynabismyname, X @zeynabjavadli, and the campaign account @justiceforzeynab. Share her posts so her voice cannot be silenced.
- Write to those who can act (see Key contacts below): the President and First Vice-President of Azerbaijan, the Azerbaijani Consulate, Dubai Police, Dubai Public Prosecution, the Dubai Media Office, and the office of Sheikh Saeed.
- Write to your MP or representative and ask them to raise the case.
- Contact your local media. Press coverage protects her.
- Tell us what you know, in confidence: press@dubaiwatch.org
Key contacts
Write to, and demand answers
- President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev: @presidentaz
- First Vice-President Mehriban Aliyeva: @firstvicepresidentazerbaijan
- Azerbaijani Consulate, Dubai: Jumeirah, Al Safa 2, Street 19a, Villa 9 · Tel +971 4 388 3727 · Hotline +971 55 482 2828 · dubai@mission.mfa.gov.az
- Dubai Police · Dubai Public Prosecution · Dubai Media Office [official channels to add]
- Office of Sheikh Saeed bin Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum [contact to add]