Dubai: A businessman has been accused of threatening to kill a stewardess, who is believed to have been his fiancé, and her family if she refused to marry him.

The 27-year-old Afghan businessman, M.S., was said to have repeatedly called up the 24-year-old British stewardess on her mobile phone and threatened to kill her and her family in August.

Besides having entered a not guilty plea before the Dubai Court of First Instance on Wednesday, the defendant produced a defence witness who confirmed that the Briton fabricated this case against M.S. out of malice.

“No, I did not threaten her,” the suspect told presiding judge Ali Atiyyah Sa’ad in courtroom three.

M.S.’s lawyer asked the court to hear two defence witnesses during Wednesday’s hearing.

“The claimant lodged this case malevolently against M.S. who is my friend. I was present with him in the car when the British woman called him repeatedly. She phoned him four to five times… she is the one who wanted to discuss their future and marriage details. He broke up with her and she wanted to pressure him and coerce him to set a date for their marriage,” the witnesses testified before presiding judge Sa’ad.

“Why would she do so? And why would she call him while she is the one who complained against him?” the judge asked the defence witness.

“After he broke up with her, she called him a number of times when I was present and he refused to take her call. When I answered one of her calls, she said that she wanted to meet him and discuss their marriage. I told her that I would pass on her message and ended the call. After she persistently called him, he got annoyed and called the police to inform them that the Briton had been harassing him over the phone… police asked him to go to the police station the next day and lodge an official complaint,” claimed the witness, identified as H.

The stewardess testified to prosecutors that when she discovered that M.S. allegedly has a criminal record she decided not to marry him.

“He threatened to kill me if I refused to marry him… he also sent a voice message to my brother [who lives in England] and threatened to kill me. When he was detained, he also called me from his detention centre and threatened me as well,” the woman told prosecutors.

Addressing a question to the defence witness, the lawyer asked: “Did he go out with the woman against her will?”

“She went out with him the next day to discuss the issue between them. She was his fiancé for nearly one year… she allegedly threatened to have him deported from the UAE because she is British,” replied H.

The court heard a second defence witness, A., who stated: “On the day the incident happened, I was present when she called him and asked to see him. They were engaged for a year before they broke up… but I don’t know why.”

Towards the end of Wednesday’s hearing, presiding judge Sa’ad granted bail to M.S.

The lawyer will present his defence when the court reconvenes on December 14.