Bahrain Says It Will End State of Emergency

JERUSALEM — The king of Bahrain said Sunday that the state of emergency he imposed in mid-March to quell antigovernment protests on that strategic and contested island will end June 1.

The announcement is a sign that Bahrain is seeking to assure banks and foreign governments that the chaos of recent months is over and that the kingdom, which depends heavily on financial business, is trying to return to normal.

It is also a sign that the numerous arrests and rushed trials of opposition figures in military courts could be running their course. Some leading opposition figures went on trial as the announcement was being made.

Bahrain is a majority Shiite Muslim country run by a Sunni royal family and elite. The government cracked down hard on the protests, which the organizers said were inspired by Egypt and Tunisia but which the government accused of being aided by Iran, which is predominantly Shiite.

The day before declaring the three-month state of emergency, the king brought in about 2,000 troops from Saudi Arabia and other neighboring countries.

Since then, hundreds of protesters and activists, including opposition leaders, have been arrested. Under the emergency statutes, they are tried in military courts and face harsh punishment through antiterrorism laws, including the death penalty. The protests have led to the deaths of at least 30 people. Among those due to be tried are journalists and medical personnel.

Some people reacted with joy to the impending end to the emergency statute.

“I am quite pleased,” Jasim Husain Ali, a legislator with the opposition Wefaq party, said by telephone. “This is what Bahrain needs now: to get on with business and with developing the political economy.”

But others saw the announcement as a ruse.

“This is a cosmetic step trying to show the international community that everything is back to normal when it is not,” Nabil Rajab, president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, said in a telephone interview. “I don’t see it as a real initiative that will solve problems. Otherwise they would release political prisoners. The dispute is wider now than it was one month ago between the ruling elite and the people.”

The Bahrain Grand Prix, originally scheduled for March 13 and a source of a big government investment, was postponed because of the unrest.

Formula One’s governing body said last week that Bahrain had until June 3 to decide if a new date could be set for this year. If Bahrain does plan to go ahead with the race, that would help explain the lifting of the state of emergency on June 1 rather than June 15 as originally planned, several Bahrainis said.

 

Bahrain Sentences 4 Protesters to Death

 

Three other activists who were also on trial in the same case received sentences of life in prison.

Human rights activists in Bahrain voiced fears that the verdicts could generate a new wave of protests in the tiny Persian Gulf kingdom. They also argued that the trial was rendered unfair by a series of legal abuses, including the arrest of one of the defendants’ lawyers, Mohammed al-Tajer, one of Bahrain’s most prominent attorneys. The suspects were also barred from meeting with their families, and the news media were not allowed to cover the trial.

“These verdicts will have a huge negative impact on the Bahraini society,” said Mohamed Maskati, who heads a human rights group in the kingdom. “We fear brutal violence in the days ahead. I am not optimistic at all — especially that there could be more similar verdicts in the near future.”

Other activists refused to talk, citing the wave of arrests that has swept the country in the past two months.

Amnesty International urged Bahrain to not carry out the verdict.

“They must uphold the right to fair trial and they must not use the death penalty under any circumstances,” it said in a statement issued Thursday.

Bahraini authorities said that the defendants had the right to appeal, though Amnesty International and local human rights groups said that the appeal would be insignificant at this point.

“The defendants received all legal rights in line with human rights international laws,” the Bahraini government said in a statement issued Thursday. “The verdict is a clear indication of the community’s utter condemnation of barbarous crimes and a profound commitment to the protection of precious lives.”

Bahrain’s Shiite majority, which has long complained of marginalization by the Sunni ruling elite, took to the streets last month in mass protests and sit-ins demanding reforms, freedoms and equal rights. The king declared martial law and sought the help of Saudi troops to crack down on protests and crush dissent.

At least 30 people were reported killed since the protests started in March, among them four in custody. Human rights activists said they died after they were severely tortured. Bahraini authorities have acknowledged the deaths but have not explained them.

The demonstrations in Bahrain were inspired by the Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings, in which both countries’ presidents stepped down under great popular pressure after only a few weeks.

The seven opposition figures in Bahrain were charged in the premeditated murder of government employees. Military prosecutors presented a video that suggested that the protesters had run the policemen over with a car. Lawyers for the accused denied the charges.

 

Medical Workers Reported Missing in Bahrain

The group, Physicians for Human Rights, cited reports from Bahrain that “doctors are disappearing as part of a systematic attack on medical staff,” and that “many physicians are missing following interrogations by unknown security forces at Salmaniya Medical Complex” in Bahrain’s capital, Manama.

In a Web posting, the group published a list of more than 30 medical personnel, from ambulance drivers to consultants and surgeons, who it said had been held.

“Although families have tried to contact administration officials, the administration denies any knowledge of their whereabouts,” the posting said. “According to family members, the physicians are being held incommunicado in unknown locations.”

There was no immediate response to the allegation from authorities in Bahrain, which enlisted military help from more than 2,000 troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to put down a pro-democracy uprising last month, and sent army and security forces to crush dissent.

The government forces have expelled protesters from Pearl Square, a traffic circle that had taken on symbolic importance for demonstrators, who likened it to Cairo’s Tahrir Square in the days before President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt was toppled in February. The government forces also moved on to the grounds of the Salmaniya hospital after it became a hub of opposition activities.

The confrontation drew on Bahrain’s tense divide between majority Shiites and the Sunni monarchy that rules them. Most of Bahrain’s doctors are Shiites and the opposition is predominantly, though not exclusively, Shiite.

This month, it was estimated that at least a dozen doctors and nurses had been arrested and held prisoner since March, and more paramedics and ambulance drivers disappeared. Ambulances were blocked from aiding wounded patients, according to health care workers and human rights advocates.

“You have an assault on the health care system and the people who practice in it,” said Dan Williams, a senior researcher for the New York-based group Human Rights Watch, said this month. “Hospitals are supposed to be used for health care and not as arbitrary detention centers.”

At a news conference this month, the acting health minister, Fatima al-Balooshi, accused scores of doctors and health care workers at Salmaniya and elsewhere of joining “a conspiracy against Bahrain from the outside” — usually a code for Iran — to destabilize the government.

Richard Sollom, the deputy director of Physicians for Human Rights, denounced the apparent assault on medical personnel in the Web posting, writing: “Doctors, nurses and other medical professionals have an ethical duty to prevent and limit suffering of patients in their care and a duty to practice medicine in a neutral way without fear or favor.”

 

Two activists die in Bahrain jail

 11 April 2011 Last updated at 06:41 ET Relatives of Ali Issa Saqer mourn during his funeral in Manama Two Bahraini Shia activists who were detained after weeks of anti-government protests, have died in police custody.

The interior ministry said Ali Issa Saqer, 31, had died when guards tried to restrain him for "causing chaos".

Another detainee, Zakaraya Rashed Hassan, 40, had died of sickle cell disease, the ministry added. It was the second such death in a week.

Several Shia activists have complained of being tortured while in custody. The government denies the allegations.

(Warning: Towards the end of the story, there is a photograph of Mr Saqer's body which viewers may find disturbing).

Bahrain imposed emergency rule last month after weeks of anti-government protests in the tiny Gulf kingdom, where the Sunni monarchy is accused of discrimination against the Shia majority.

The authorities used force to put down the protests, which started on 14 February and have left more than 25 people dead.

Rights groups say the government has since detained more than 400 people - including human rights activists, doctors, bloggers and opposition supporters.

Latest deaths

The interior ministry said Mr Saqer was injured while resisting guards' attempts to restrain him. He later died in a hospital.

Photos taken prior to his burial showed purple lash marks all over his back. His legs were also badly bruised, and his toes and feet were covered in purple bruises.

Mr Saqer was detained on 13 March for the attempted murder of a policeman, the ministry said. The government denies any torture but says all such accusations will be investigated.

It said the other detainee, Mr Hassan, had been "found dead" in his cell. A post-mortem said he died of complications from sickle-cell anaemia.

Mr Hassan was detained on 2 April on charges of "inciting hatred, publishing false news, promoting sectarianism and calling for the overthrow of the regime" on social networking sites, the interior ministry said.

Activists say both men were abused physically and mentally, and may have died as a result.

"We believed they killed them in prison," Nabeel Rajab of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights.

Campaign of fear

On Monday, the authorities accused Mr Rajab of publishing fabricated images on the internet and summoned him for questioning.

A researcher from Human Rights Watch examines Mr Saqer's injuries

Meanwhile, the former chief editor of Bahrain's main opposition newspaper - al-Wasat - said he too had been summoned by a prosecutor investigating the paper's allegedly unethical coverage of the uprising.

The latest moves come two days after a leading opposition figure and rights activist, Abdul Hadi al-Khawaja, was beaten up and arrested in the capital, Manama.

The unrest started on 14 February, when Shia protesters - emboldened by uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt - took to the streets urging democratic reform. Some called for the overthrow of the monarchy.

Weeks of protests prompted the Sunni-led government to impose martial law and invite in troops from Sunni-ruled neighbours such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Since then the Bahrain government - a key US ally in the region - has launched a crackdown against opposition activists, journalists and doctors.

It accuses Iran of fomenting the unrest - which Tehran denies.