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Tags: Qatar | US | trial

Qatar to Allow US Couple to Fly Home Wednesday: Envoy

Tuesday, 02 December 2014 12:49 PM EST

Qatar is to allow an American couple to fly home Wednesday, after a three-day holdup since they were cleared of wrongdoing in their adopted daughter's death, the US ambassador said.

An appeals court in Doha on Sunday acquitted Matthew and Grace Huang of parental neglect following the death of eight-year-old Gloria, who had been adopted from an orphanage in Ghana, and said they were free to leave.

But at the airport, the Huangs were prevented from leaving Doha.

In a Tweet on Tuesday, US ambassador Dana Shell Smith wrote: "Just informed by GoQ (the government of Qatar) that all requirements met... travel ban to be lifted. Huangs can go tomorrow (Wednesday)."

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters in Washington on Monday that US officials were working with Qatari counterparts to resolve the case.

"While the case was overturned, the travel ban was not yet overturned," spokeswoman Psaki said, referring to "some paperwork that needs to be filed."

The Huangs, who are of Asian descent, were arrested in January 2013.

They were initially accused of starving Gloria to death to sell her organs, but later jailed for three years for parental neglect.

They insist that Gloria died of an eating disorder rooted in a troubled early childhood.

They were released in November last year pending an appeal, but the court at the time denied their request to leave Qatar to join their other two adopted children in the United States.

Adoption and multiracial families are rare in Qatar, a conservative Arab emirate, and the family's supporters maintain Qatari authorities misunderstood the Huangs' situation.

The public prosecutor originally pushed for the death penalty for the couple.

The Huangs moved to Qatar in 2012 for Matthew, an engineer, to work on infrastructure projects linked to the 2022 football World Cup.

 

© AFP 2025


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Qatar is to allow an American couple to fly home Wednesday, after a three-day holdup since they were cleared of wrongdoing in their adopted daughter's death, the US ambassador said.An appeals court in Doha on Sunday acquitted Matthew and Grace Huang of parental neglect...
Qatar, US, trial
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2014-49-02
Tuesday, 02 December 2014 12:49 PM
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