Al-Amin Kimathi is the Executive Coordinator of the Muslim Human Rights Forum which was set up in 2005 to work on human rights issues relevant to the Muslim community in Kenya. With the escalation of the war in Somalia, the influx of Somali refugees and the clamp down on members of the Muslim community in the name of the “war on terror”, rendition became the key issue.

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Kenyan and Somali members of the Muslim community were arbitrarily detained and held in secret Kenyan prisons or “rendered” to Somalia. The Forum documented 152 cases of arbitrary arrest of members of the Muslim community and tracked where they were being detained. Because of his work monitoring arrests and conditions of detention and providing assistance to those who have been released, Al-Amin Kimathi has been harassed, intimidated, threatened and warned that the only reason he is alive is that if he was killed it could be linked to the security services. Every time a member of the organisation is arrested they are questioned about the movements of Al-Amin Kimathi. “They haven’t come for me but they will”.