Associated Press
Shrien Dewan.
London - South Africa was a civilised country with a legal system equivalent to the UK that would provide Shrien Dewani with a fair trial and all the medication he needed to treat his mental illness.
This was the thrust of the argument put forward by the South African government on Thursday during the 31-year-old British businessman's extradition hearing at the Belmarsh Magistrate's Court in London.
The government's lawyer, Hugo Keith QC, said that South Africa had a similar legal system to the UK and would provide Dewani with a fair trial.
Dewani is accused of arranging the killing of his wife, Anni Hindocha, who was murdered in Cape Town last year while they were on honeymoon.
Keith broke down point by point Dewani's defence built on the contention that he faced being raped in a South African prison; that he was mentally unfit to plead to any charges and that extraditing him would be a violation of his rights.
He argued that the court must satisfy itself that the country requesting extradition had an equivalent legal structure in place and sufficient medical care for an accused person.
He said the assertion that Dewani's human rights would be violated if extradited fell "short of the required threshold".
Keith said the court could turn down an extradition request only if it was determined that extraditing a person would violate his "fundamental human rights".
"It is a very high threshold," he said.
He said it would be a different scenario if Dewani was being extradited to a country where there was a real possibility that the state would torture him.
He said there was almost a "hidden perception" in the Dewani defence that only the UK could treat his mental illness.
"South Africa is a civilised and in many respects a modern country that will provide Dewani with (medical) care. There is no suggestion that South African authorities will receive a sick man and say 'we don't care, we will let him rot'," he said.
Keith said the South African authorities had put on the table several options regarding where Dewani would be held if extradited to the country.
One of the options would be to take Dewani to the Valkenberg Psychiatric Hospital immediately on him landing in the country while the other options were to keep him in the sick bay of either Goodwood, Malmesbury Medium A or Brandvlei Maximum B – with Goodwood being the facility of choice.
In ending his closing arguments, Keith said the court should take the South African government's promises that Dewani would be held in a decent prison in good faith.
After sitting through four days of intense legal argument, Anni Hindocha's family wants closure. At least 11 members of the family travelled from Sweden to be in the UK this week for the final instalment of the extradition hearing.
Speaking outside the court on Thursday, Anni's father, Vinod Hindocha, 62, said they needed to move on with their lives.
"We're really asking the court here: "Finish this, get us a closure so that we can move along with our lives. We need the answers; we're begging for that," he said.
Anni's uncle, Ashok Hindocha, 52, said the family had got tremendous support from the South African and British public.
"It gives us energy," he said. "We do believe it will be a fair extradition process here in England and a fair trial in South Africa."
The hearing was adjourned until August 10 when Chief Magistrate Howard Riddle is expected to hand down judgment. - Pretoria News
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