As a result of shooting a wedding video against the backdrop of the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi, a Russian filmmaker ended up in jail.
Russian film director Arik Manukyan has not been able to leave the UAE since May this year due to proceedings regarding unauthorized shooting of a mosque using a drone, Kommersant reports.
Manukyan and his brother arrived in the UAE to shoot a wedding video of his friends. For one of the scenes, the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi was chosen as the background. Recording was carried out from a drone, while the film crew remained in the parking lot. The drone was spotted by security guards, who demanded to immediately stop shooting and provide materials for study.
A few hours later, police intervened in the conflict, who, after studying the recording, detained Arik Manukyan himself, his brother and relative of the groom. Three people were interrogated. Their passports and phones were seized. After that, the detainees spent six days in custody without the opportunity to contact representatives of the Russian consulate.
According to Kommersant, the Russian side subsequently intervened in the case, and the arrested were released from prison with a ban on leaving the country. They are under house arrest in Dubai.
According to the director, the prosecution concerns not only the unauthorized shooting of the mosque and the use of the drone without a license, but also getting into the frame of the airport.
Ramil Bikmullin, head of the consular department of the Russian Embassy in the UAE, does not exclude the possibility of imprisonment of those arrested as a result of the proceedings. The case is pending with the Prosecutor General. The court will choose a preventive measure when the case is transferred. The consular department is doing everything possible so that detainees escaped with fines. The case is complicated by the fact that the prosecution concerns unauthorized shooting of a government building.
In the UAE, after a series of incidents with unauthorized penetration of unmanned aerial vehicles at airports, the rules for the ownership and use of drones were seriously tightened. A number of fines associated with drones reaches 3 million dirhams ($ 817.4 thousand).
In addition, in April this year, the Dubai Civil Aviation Authority introduced a mandatory requirement for the registration of all unmanned aerial vehicles in the emirate with a ban on the sale of drones without a license.
