Amnesty International Report 2015/16 - Bahrain

Kingdom of Bahrain
Head of state: King Hamad bin 'Issa Al Khalifa
Head of government: Shaikh Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa

The government continued to curtail freedoms of expression, association and assembly and cracked down further on online and other dissent. Opposition leaders remained imprisoned; some were prisoners of conscience. Torture and other ill-treatment remained common. Scores were sentenced to long prison terms after unfair trials. Authorities stripped at least 208 people of their Bahraini nationality. Eight people were sentenced to death; there were no executions.

BACKGROUND

Tension remained high between the minority Sunni-dominated government and the opposition, which was supported mainly by the Shi'a majority population. There were frequent protests by Shi'a demanding the release of imprisoned opposition leaders, to which the security forces often responded with excessive force. The police were targeted in several bomb explosions; one killed two police officers on the island of Sitra in July, and another killed an officer in the village of Karannah in August.

In March, Bahrain joined the Saudi Arabia-led coalition that engaged in the armed conflict in Yemen (see Yemen entry).

The authorities constructed new facilities in Dry Dock Prison to hold children aged 15 to 18, transferring 300 juvenile offenders from Jaw Prison to Dry Dock in May.

In June, the US government lifted its embargo on arms sales to the Bahrain National Guard and Bahrain Defence Forces, and in August approved a US$150 million deal to supply military aircraft parts, ammunition and communications equipment to Bahrain.

A joint statement signed by 35 countries at the UN Human Rights Council in September expressed serious concern about human rights violations in Bahrain including imprisonment of those exercising their rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association, and lack of accountability.

FREEDOMS OF EXPRESSION AND ASSOCIATION

The authorities severely curtailed the rights to freedom of expression and association, and arrested and prosecuted political and religious activists who criticized the government through social media or at public gatherings. Others were prosecuted and convicted for criticizing the late King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and the Saudi-led air strikes in Yemen. The authorities continued to detain prisoners of conscience sentenced after unfair trials in previous years. Several prisoners of conscience were released after completing their sentences.

In March, the Shura Council approved amendments to Article 364 of the Penal Code which would increase the penalty for "insulting parliament, the Shura Council, security forces, judges or public interest" to two years' imprisonment, and increase the maximum prison sentence for publicly encouraging others to "defame" to three years' imprisonment, or longer for defamation in the media; the amendments had not been enacted by the end of the year. In September, the Cabinet approved regulations which would penalize media outlets for "spreading false or damaging information that could affect foreign relations".

Police rearrested prominent human rights defender Nabeel Rajab in April for posts on Twitter about torture in Jaw Prison and Saudi-led air strikes in Yemen, and in May an appeal court confirmed his earlier six-month sentence for "publicly insulting official institutions". In July, the authorities released him under a royal pardon, four days after the European Parliament adopted a resolution urging the government to release him and other prisoners of conscience. He remained banned from leaving Bahrain.

In October, a court upheld the conviction of activist Zainab al-Khawaja and reduced her three-year prison sentence to one year for "insulting the King" by ripping up a photo of the King in court in October 2014. A court also upheld her convictions for "destroying government property" and "insulting a public official".

The authorities summoned and interrogated some political opposition leaders, and prosecuted and imprisoned others on vague charges. In June, Sheikh 'Ali Salman, Secretary General of the main opposition party, Al-Wefaq National Islamic Society, received a four-year prison term after an unfair trial on charges that included "public incitement to loathing and contempt of a sect of people which will result in disrupting public order".

In July, a month after his release from prison under a royal pardon, security authorities arrested Ebrahim Sharif, the former Secretary General of the National Democratic Action Society (Wa'ad) party, and charged him with "inciting hatred and contempt of the regime" and attempting to overthrow the regime "by force and illegal means". His trial was ongoing at the end of the year.

A court sentenced Fadhel Abbas Mahdi Mohamed, Secretary General of the Unitary National Democratic Assemblage (al-Wahdawi) party, to five years in prison in June for "spreading false information" after the party said the Saudi-led air strikes in Yemen were a violation of international law.

The authorities continued to prevent or restrict visits to Bahrain by international human rights groups, including Amnesty International.

FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY

The authorities continued to ban all demonstrations in the capital, Manama, but protests continued in Shi'a villages demanding the release of political prisoners. The security forces frequently used excessive force, including tear gas and shotguns, to disperse protesters, injuring some protesters and bystanders. They also arrested and beat protesters. Some protesters received prison sentences.

In January, a police officer shot a protester carrying a photo of opposition leader Sheikh 'Ali Salman at close range in the village of Bilad al-Qadeem. In November, a court acquitted the officer.

DEPRIVATION OF NATIONALITY

The authorities revoked the nationality of Bahrainis convicted of terrorism-related offences or other illegal acts, stripping at least 208 people, including nine children, of their citizenship during the year, rendering many stateless. An appeal court reinstated the nationality of nine individuals.

In January, the Interior Ministry revoked the citizenship of 72 of the 208 people, including human rights defenders and former MPs, as well as Bahrainis allegedly fighting with the armed group Islamic State (IS). One of the 72 was deported; others were told to surrender their passports and identification cards and commit to regularizing their legal status as foreigners, or leave Bahrain. Some filed a court appeal against the decision but this was rejected in December.

TORTURE AND OTHER ILL-TREATMENT

Torture and other ill-treatment of detainees, mainly suspects in security or terrorism-related cases, remained rife, particularly within the Criminal Investigations Directorate (CID). Police and other security officials also beat or otherwise abused people when arresting them and transporting them to police stations. At Jaw Prison, detainees faced repeated beatings, were required to sleep in tents and were denied any communication with their families for several weeks after the security forces used tear gas and shotguns to quell a disturbance at the prison in March.

Human rights defender Hussain Jawad, Chairman of the European-Bahraini organization for Human Rights, said he was blindfolded, handcuffed behind his back, denied access to a toilet, beaten and threatened with sexual abuse while under interrogation by CID officers after his arrest in February. Although the Public Prosecution Office ordered his release, CID officers took him back into detention and again tortured him until he "confessed" to receiving money to support and finance subversive groups. He later refuted this confession and lodged a complaint of torture with the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), the institution in charge of investigating police abuses. The SIU subsequently closed the investigation citing a lack of evidence. In December, a court sentenced Hussain Jawad to two years in prison.

UNFAIR TRIALS

Hundreds of people were convicted in unfair trials on charges of rioting, illegal gathering or committing terrorism-related offences. Many defendants in terrorism cases were convicted largely on the basis of "confessions" that they said interrogators had forced them to make under torture; some received death sentences.

Abbas Jamil al-Samea' and two other men were sentenced to death in February, convicted of a bombing in March 2014. Their trial, in which seven co-defendants were sentenced to life imprisonment, was unfair: the court failed to adequately investigate their allegations of torture and other ill-treatment by CID interrogators; they were denied access to their lawyers until their trial began; their lawyers were not permitted to see the full case file, and their requests to cross-examine prosecution witnesses were ignored.

IMPUNITY

A climate of impunity persisted. The authorities failed to hold senior officials accountable for torture and other human rights violations committed during and since the 2011 protests. The few investigations that led to prosecutions of some low-ranking police officers resulted in lenient sentences or acquittals.

In April, a court acquitted a police officer of causing the death of Fadhel Abbas Muslim Marhoon, who was shot in the head in January 2014. The officer was sentenced to three months in prison for injuring Sadeq al-Asfoor, who was with Fadhel Abbas, by shooting him in the stomach. The SIU appealed against the three-month sentence.

In November, the Court of Cassation ordered the retrial of two police officers convicted of causing the death in custody of 'Ali 'Issa al-Saqer in 2011. An appeal court had reduced their 10-year prison sentences to two years in September 2013.

In June, six police officers received prison sentences ranging from one to five years for causing the death in custody of Hassan al-Shaikh in November 2014.

WOMEN'S RIGHTS

In April, parliament voted down an article in the new Domestic Violence Protection Law (Law 17 of 2015) that would have criminalized marital rape. The law, which was enacted in August, empowered the Public Prosecution Office and courts to issue protection orders of up to three months for victims of domestic violence, and set a penalty of three months' imprisonment for breaches of the order involving violence.

DEATH PENALTY

The death penalty remained in force for murder, terrorism-related offences and other crimes, including drugs offences. The courts sentenced eight people to death, some after unfair trials, and commuted two death sentences to life imprisonment. There were no executions.