Posts Tagged ‘Bahrain’

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Doctors and Nurses in Bahrain targeted for repression

July 7, 2011

As the human rights crisis in Bahrain continues Front Line and other NGOs express their deep concern about the ongoing prosecution and persecution of doctors and nurses who are facing the prospect of prison sentences simply because they treated injured demonstrators during the recent disturbances. Severe sentences have handed down on human rights defenders, including Abdulahadi Al Khawaja who was recently sentenced to life imprisonment.
In no other country in the world have we witnessed doctors and nurses persecuted on such a scale as a result of their legitimate humanitarian actions, says Front Line:  47 members of the medical  profession were arrested, several of them reportedly tortured, and  all of whom are currently being subjected to an unfair trial. They feel abandoned by the international community. 

Please – show your support for these brave men and women – add your name to the open letter to the King of Bahrain via the link below and which will be published in The Guardian and the London Independent this Friday

http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/petitions/bahrainopenletter#sign>

Posted in Front Line, Human Rights Defenders | 1 Comment »
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Bahrain misinformation about the UN exposed and – hopefully – it backfires

June 8, 2011

Amidst the many reports on violations of human rights in Bahrain, especially the vulnerable situation of human rights defenders, a surprising announcement caught my eye on 8 June: the GULF DAILY NEWS – The voice of Bahrain stated under the headline “UN raps lies about Bahrain” that:  “A top UN official yesterday admitted it received false information about what happened in Bahrain during the unrest. “Certain information which we received about the developments in Bahrain was untrue,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) Dr Navi Pillay said as she held talks with Social Development Minister and Acting Health Minister Dr Fatima Al Balooshi, on the sidelines of a meeting of the Children’s Rights Committee in Geneva. Dr Pillay acknowledged that the situation in Bahrain is by far different, and is thus incomparable to ongoing unrest in other countries in the region….Dr Al Balooshi briefed Dr Pillay on the current situation in Bahrain, stressing that things had returned to normal {sic}.”

So I was very relieved to read just now that UN rights chief slams ‘blatant distortion’ in reports of her meeting with Bahrain officials (AP, UPI and many others).  The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, sharply criticizes Bahrain for inaccurate reports by its state-run news agency on her meeting with government officials in Geneva last week and flatly denies telling Bahrain officials that her office received “misinformation” about Bahrain’s crackdown on anti-government protesters. Her spokesman, Rupert Colville, says that the High Commissioner “made no such statement and is disturbed by this blatant distortion of her words” and that she will formally request government officials who attended the meeting to issue a correction.

And I now see that the official Bahrain News Agency (BNA) declines responsibility referring to the report it received from the Ministry of Social Development, but this statement contains no such quote from the High Commissioner, see for yourself on http://www.bna.bh/portal/en/news/459935!

Posted in human rights, UN | 1 Comment »
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Bahrain, hell for human rights defenders

April 11, 2011

Human Rights Watch and the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies reported on Wednesday 6 April that hundreds of people have been detained or arbitrarily arrested in Bahrain, activists barred from traveling abroad and several protesters killed as security forces in balaclavas and military fatigues resort to excessive force and storm villages, hospitals and news organizations. They called on the UN to hold an emergency session on Bahrain.

The same day Mohammad al-Maskati, the head of Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, said in an interview with Press TV that the “Bahraini authorities are not only arresting the opposition leaders, but also human rights defenders, doctors, a lot of religious figures … anyone who may affect the situation in Bahrain”.

Bahrain’s leading opposition group, al-Wefaq, also says over 450 opposition activists, including 14 women, have been arrested since the uprising began in the tiny Persian Gulf state in mid-February.

On Thursday 14 April Nabeel Rajab, the president of the Bahrain center for Human Rights added during an interview with the Voice of America that the situation is ‘very critical’. “You have approximately one for every 1,000 citizens detained right now for political reasons”. The interviewer, Hilleary, asked what Rajab believed the detained persons are going through “I am afraid that many bloggers and [those] who are active in the net – on Twitter and Facebook – are facing very hard times at this point in time”. 
The interview then turned to his own risk (“are you fearful of speaking out?”). 
Rajab’s reply is worth quoting in full as it shows the uncompromising dedication that many Human Rights Defenders share: “Arrests, harassments and intimidation will never stop an activist who believes in his work and believes in the importance of his work. I do believe in my work very much. I was arrested, as I told you, and I was beaten up, but that has encouraged me to do more activism, believing [that] this situation cannot continue. And this activism that we are doing – it has a cost. The cost might reach – it might be our life – but, you know, once we believe in our work, once I believe in my work, I am willing to see [through] the changes that I am fighting for.”

The international human rights movement should ensure that it does not have to come to such sacrifices and that is what this little blog is about.

 

Posted in HRW, human rights, Human Rights Defenders | 1 Comment »
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