Bahrain’s human rights record came under fresh scrutiny on Tuesday after British peers linked the kingdom’s arrest of two prominent opposition figures to their attendance of a seminar in the House of Lords.
By Adrian Blomfield, Middle East Correspondent
Published: 6:02PM BST 06 Sep 2010
Abduljalil al-Singace and Abdulghani al-Kanjar were seized by police at Bahrain’s international airport as they walked off a flight from London in mid-August.
Bahrain’s human rights record came under fresh scrutiny on Tuesday after British peers linked the kingdom’s arrest of two prominent opposition figures to their attendance of a seminar in the House of Lords.
By Adrian Blomfield, Middle East Correspondent
Published: 6:02PM BST 06 Sep 2010
Abduljalil al-Singace and Abdulghani al-Kanjar were seized by police at Bahrain’s international airport as they walked off a flight from London in mid-August.
They were last week charged, along with 21 other opposition activists, with terrorism-related offensives after what Bahrain, an island state in the Persian Gulf, described as an exhaustive investigation. Officials hinted that the men were part of an Iranian-backed plot to overthrow the government.
But peers insisted that the real reason for their detentions, as well as the alleged torture of Mr Singace, was their presence at a seminar on Bahrain in the House of Lords last month. The conference heard testimony of abuses in the kingdom.
Among the official accusations brought against the men was a charge of “contacting foreign organisations and providing them with false and misleading information about the kingdom.”
They face the death penalty if convicted, lawyers said.
Shaikh Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, Bahrain’s foreign minister, said: “The recent arrests made in Bahrain have absolutely no relation to the political views held by any Bahraini national residing in or outside of Bahrain. It would be an error in the extreme to allow these individuals currently facing serious criminal charges and due process of law, to somehow masquerade as champions of democratic values.”
Members of the House of Lords alleged that the two had been caught up in a politically-motivated sweep of Shia activists critical of the Sunni-dominated government ahead of parliamentary elections next month.
Lord Avebury, the vice chairman of the parliamentary human rights group, expressed particular concern about the treatment of Mr Singace, who is a senior figure in al Haq, one of Bahrain’s main opposition groups.
“When he got off the plane he was blindfolded and handcuffed and kept in that state for 12 days,” Lord Avebury said. “He was extensively beaten and deprived of access to a shower and a lavatory. His treatment was just inhuman.”
A British subject, Jaffar al-Hasadi, is among those detained, Lord Avebury said.
Baroness Falkner, the Liberal Democrat peer who chaired the seminar, said that the men at the seminar had told conference delegates that the al-Khalifa ruling family was usurping land in the kingdom. She said the real reason for the arrests was their presence at the conference in the first place.
“The fact that the seminar was held in the House of Lords with the participation of well known human rights groups attracted the attention of the authorities in a way that hasn’t happened in the past,” she said.
The arrests triggered a series of clashes between supporters of the Shia opposition and the security forces, raising worrying questions about the stability of a strategically vital western ally. Bahrain is the base of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet.
Along with Kuwait, Bahrain is one of the few Gulf states to have instituted some democratic reforms but the kingdom is facing renewed allegations of torture and repression from western rights groups.
Lord Avebury attacked the British government’s reluctance to criticise the record of its long-standing ally and gave warning that a lack of western pressure could result in growing instability in the kingdom.
“There comes a point when resentment will be so intense that you could get very serious disruptions and loss of life. I do think the British government should pay more attention than they do,” he said.
Western officials fear that instability in Bahrain could play into the hands of Iran, where hardliners have sometimes described the kingdom as Iran’s “14th Province”.
The Foreign Office said the British ambassador in Bahrain had met the country’s interior minister to call for a transparent investigation into the detentions.
“We note the Government’s undertaking to be transparent and encourage them to conduct their investigation in accordance with the rule of law,” a spokesman said.
The spokesman also denied Lord Avebury’s assertion that Britain was unwilling to challenge Bahrain’s democratic record.
“It is not true that we are reluctant to raise human rights issues with the Bahraini Government,” she said. “We raise these issues both in public and private with the Bahraini authorities as appropriate, including at senior levels.”