Public outrage over Sheikha Latifa’s disappearance prompts Princess Haya, Sheikh Mohammed’s wife and Jordanian royalty, to get involved. But Haya has secrets herself, and before long, her own relationship with Sheikh Mohammed takes a dark turn. Click ‘Subscribe’ at the top of the Infamous show page on Apple Podcasts or visit GetTheBinge.com to get access wherever you get your podcasts. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices A Campside Media & Sony Music Entertainment production. To connect with Infamous's creative team and gain access to behind the scenes content, join our community at Campsidemedia.com/join Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the main focus of Episode 3 on Dubai's missing princesses?
Hey, infamous listeners. This is episode three of our series on Dubai's missing princesses. If you haven't listened to the first two episodes, please pause this episode and scroll back in your feed so you can get all caught up.
If Sheikh Mohammed felt any pressure from the whole Sheikha Latifa ordeal, it didn't show. He was busy with, among other things, horse racing.
Some horses just give you that feeling, you know, telling you that there is something about them. Through their eye you can see their heart and the horses is fantastic.
He was also a horse owner, one of the biggest in the world. He's a fixture at Ascot and always used to sit in the royal box with the queen. He started one of the most successful horse racing teams in the world, Godolphin.
And it's Massos investing Derby in the hands of William Ewing for Godolphin. How irresponsible! Now, someone would sometimes accompany Sheikh Mo on his various equestrian journeys. Someone who was about to become very important to Sheikha Latifa's story. And Princess Haya, amazing for your team.
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Chapter 2: Who is Princess Haya and how is she related to Sheikha Latifa?
Princess Haya, Sheikh Mohammed's second official wife. She had glossy highlights and glowing skin. She was sort of like an Arab version of Princess Di. Haya was well-traveled, cultured, and a prize-winning showjumper.
She turned a childhood passion into a profession when she went on to represent her country at the Olympics in Australia in 2000.
When Haya was 26, she became the first Arab woman equestrian in the Olympics.
So Haya is a highly, highly intelligent, very erudite, very smart, very anglicised woman.
That's Louise Callahan, a journalist who covers the region.
She went to boarding school in the UK and then to Oxford. She's got this love of Jilly Cooper novels, which are these kind of raunchy, Mills and Boone-style novels. She's very multilingual. She's lived in Paris for a while. Very worldly.
Unlike Sheikh Mo's other wives, Haya was famous in her own right. You see, she's the daughter of King Hussein of Jordan and the stepdaughter of Queen Noor, the progressive monarch of Jordan.
Women are not simply a category of a problem to be addressed or ignored. They are key to the solution.
Queen Noor was absolutely beloved in the West and in Jordan, too. And when Haya's own mother died in a helicopter accident, when Haya was only about three years old, Queen Noor eventually became her stepmother. Aya's world as a child was about Queen Noor and about horse riding. When she was very young, her father gave her a foal who had also lost its mother.
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Chapter 3: What are the dynamics between Sheikh Mohammed and Princess Haya?
She was the perfect symbol for Dubai's new, modernized image. Never mind that she was about 25 years younger than Sheikh Mo.
The idea that she would marry him came as a great surprise to lots of people who knew her. Mohammed. Despite his love of horse racing and having lots of property in the UK, his whole outlook on life is very, very centred. From Dubai, her role, it appeared, was to be the face of the family. So she would appear wearing Western clothes at Ascot with him. She'd be photographed with the Queen.
Princess Haya was about to play another very important role on the world stage, a role that involved Latifah. From Campside Media and Sony Music Entertainment, I'm Vanessa Grigoriadis. I'm Natalie Robamed. And this is Infamous, Dubai's Missing Princesses, Episode 3. So last episode, Latifa escaped from Dubai, only to be hauled back soon after.
Right. And she recorded that video that would go viral, the one that Louise watched in a cafe in Beirut.
So now we're going to hear more about Sheikh Mo's most public wife, Princess Haya, and what she did or didn't know. That's coming up after the break.
When a young woman named Patty vanishes without a trace, her best friend launches a desperate search, and the trail leads to Kat Torres, a charismatic influencer with millions of followers. Her social media presence showcases a picture-perfect life, and she promises her followers a spiritual awakening. All they have to do is follow her lead.
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Chapter 4: How does Princess Haya respond to Latifa's disappearance?
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You're listening to Infamous from Campside Media.
So Haya told a court she only became aware of Latifa's disappearance when the rest of the world did in March 2018. Initially, she thought Sheikh Mohammed couldn't possibly be responsible for the forcible return of his daughter. Haya and Sheikh Mohammed had a son and a daughter of their own. He often doted on them, especially their daughter Jalila, who seemed to be Mohammed's favorite.
Haya says she asked her husband about Latifa's video. She says he told her that Latifa was bipolar and unstable. Mental illness is even more stigmatized in the Arab world than in the West. So dubbing Latifa as bipolar effectively painted her as persona non grata. Princess Haya says she felt sympathy for both Latifa and Sheikh Mohammed. But she was basically not involved. Until December 2018.
Some viewers may find upsetting the mystery of the missing princess.
This BBC documentary was a major news event. Latifa's story was not going away. Dubai's ruler was forced to publicly respond.
This private family matter has caused significant upset and distress for all concerned, most of all Sheikha Latifa. She and her family are looking forward to celebrating her birthday today, in privacy and peace, and to building a happy and stable future for her.
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Chapter 5: What role did Mary Robinson play in the Sheikha Latifa case?
The very same day, a United Nations committee made another request that Dubai prove Latifa was alive. Princess Haya sprang into action. Haya called her friend, Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland and the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
She asked me to come to Dubai and help with a family dilemma.
On December 15th, 2018, Mary Robinson says she went to one of Haya's residences for lunch. Mary sat down with Latifa and a couple others. An array of fruit plates and Evian bottles lay before them on a table. They looked at each other, warily, chatting.
So at that point, there's been a lot of questions about whether Latifa's actually alive. There's a lot of people who have been desperately hoping for the UN in particular to arrange a proof of life from Latifa, get some kind of statement out for her.
This lunch with Mary Robinson was supposed to assuage concerns. But the whole thing just looked off. Robinson was dressed for a stately lunch, a white collared shirt under a tailored peach jacket, pearl earrings. Latifah was dressed in a hoodie, zipped all the way up.
What we get is this weird situation where Mary Robinson rocks up in Dubai, sits down, poses for a photo with Latifa, who, you know, looks like completely blank-eyed and like there's nothing going on. And she looks scared, if anything, I think.
Weeks after the lunch, Mary Robinson gave a public interview.
She's troubled. She made a video that she now regrets making. I had lunch with her. She's a very likable young woman, but clearly troubled, clearly needs the medical care that she's receiving. The lunch totally backfired.
The result of this was that the whole issue with Latifa all of a sudden just got a lot more attention.
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Chapter 6: How did media coverage affect the Sheikha Latifa situation?
Yes, I understand that. And I hear what you're saying. It is a private family matter. And I don't want to go any more deeply into it for the protection of Latifa herself and to ensure that she's not used by anyone else. She's a vulnerable young woman. And that's what's important to me. And what's important to us as a family is to ensure that she's all right. Basically, Haya spouted the party line.
Being asked for proof of life and being asked to prove that someone's that we love, that I love, is simply a lie, is absurd. We've done our utmost to help and protect and support her through this period. It's unimaginable that this thing has gone so far from the truth.
Haya made it clear that she'd acted of her own volition.
I really wanted to get the right advice from Mary on how to move forward. And I wanted her to give me that counsel. I did it as myself. There was no official party. There was no commission. There was no terms of reference. I made the call.
Any time the interviewer pressed her on Latifa's disappearance and the BBC documentary's reporting, Haya said the same thing.
I'm not here to go into the details of what is a private family matter.
She pushed Mohammed's narrative. that Latifa's escape had been a kidnapping.
Was there a ransom bid?
I believe that that has been clearly communicated on a number of occasions. Yes, there was.
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Chapter 7: What was Princess Haya's public response to the controversy?
As the Mary Robinson episode played out, Tina Jauhiainen looked on in horror. After Tina got out of jail in the UAE, she started working with others on a campaign they dubbed hashtag free Latifa. But she hadn't been able to get back in touch with Latifa. In fact, no one had heard from her in months. Then Tina was in Finland, sitting with her brother, when she got an odd message.
I was obviously receiving a lot of random messages from people who are interested about this story or the campaign. But there was something different about this. There was a person wanting to deliver a message from Latifa to me.
This was a total stranger. The person said Tina would need to answer a series of security questions before they would give her the note.
What did I get as a birthday gift from her in 2014? And what was the nickname I gave her when we started Capoeira? So they were kind of questions that a random person would not be able to ask me. That night, I couldn't sleep. Yeah, I was so excited and nervous at the same time. Like, what's really going on, you know? Am I going to be able to talk to her soon?
Yes, it was just really, really amazing.
Finally, Tina received a picture of a letter Latifa had written to her.
It was as if she wanted to explain everything on one page. There was just so many things, what happened to her, where she has been since we last met, everything in detail. I was obviously thrilled, first of all, to learn that she was alive. Tina began corresponding with Latifa regularly. Latifa told her that since her capture, she'd been held hostage in a villa that had been converted into a jail.
The reality was grim and sad. I was communicating with my friend who was held hostage. I didn't know how long we would be able to have this contact.
Tina and her associates managed to smuggle a cell phone to Latifa and Latifa started sending them video messages. The situation is very hard. In one, Latifa sat in the corner of a bathroom wearing a dark shirt. She brought up Mary Robinson's visit and told the story, but from her side.
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