Ahead of elections: Bahrain govt threatens website owners with prosecution

Website of opposition political party among 8 new sites ordered to be blocked
Govt attempts to cover up election rigging scandal
BCHR calls on bloggers to highlight Bandargate
Bahrain Center for Human Rights
November 2, 2006
Ref: 06110200
Website of opposition political party among 8 new sites ordered to be blocked
Govt attempts to cover up election rigging scandal
BCHR calls on bloggers to highlight Bandargate
Bahrain Center for Human Rights
November 2, 2006
Ref: 06110200
The Bahrain Center for Human Rights condemns recent threats by the Ministry of Information to prosecute website owners for discussing the recent Bandargate scandal. The BCHR has also received a copy of a new decree from the ministry, dated October 30, 2006, ordering eight more websites to be blocked, bringing the total number of censored sites to 24 (click here to view the decree). Among the blocked sites are the websites of the BCHR (bahrainrights.org), the Arab Network for Human Rights Information (hrinfo.net), and the website of the National Democratic Action Society (aldemokrati.org), a popular opposition political party.
(See the full list of blocked sites here, and previous press releases about to the recent Internet censorship: BCHR Ref: 06103001 and Ref: 06102600).
Hassan Oun, director of press and publications at the information ministry, wrote in a statement published in the press on November 1:

“The information ministry has decided to close a number of Bahraini and foreign websites … These sites transgressed a legal decision prohibiting the discussion of the case of the accused Salah Al Bander … The information ministry will refer the owners of these sites to the judges for not cooperating and complying with the law.” [1]

Attempts to cover up election scandal

The statement from the ministry refers to the case of Salah Al-Bandar, which has come to be known as the ‘Bandargate scandal‘ [2]. In early September 2006, Dr Salah Al-Bandar, an advisor to the Ministry of Cabinet Affairs, distributed a 240-page report alleging a conspiracy led by certain government officials to marginalize the majority Shia community and rig the parliamentary elections due to be held on November 25. Dr Al-Bandar was subsequently arrested, questioned for two hours, and put on a plane to the United Kingdom, as he is a British citizen. He was later charged (in absentia) with seizing government papers and stealing two private cheques. On October 4, the High Criminal Court issued a gag order banning the publishing of any news, comments or information related to the case against Salah Al Bandar (see BCHR Ref: 06100500).
As of yet, none of the alleged government conspirators identified in the Bandargate report have been charged or suspended from office, and the government has refused to comment on the allegations.
The Bahrain Center for Human Rights is highly skeptical of the justification for the gag order, as the case against Dr Al-Bandar is to be decided by a judge, and not a citizen’s jury. Rather, the BCHR perceives this as a possible attempt by the government to hide the details of the Bandargate scandal, as it may damage the credibility of the elections due to be held three weeks from now. That the government is now threatening to even prosecute website owners who discuss the scandal only further strenghtens this suspicion.

Call for bloggers to highlight Bandargate, and for govt to end net censorship

The BCHR is deeply concerned about the expanding restrictions on freedom of expression in Bahrain, so close to the upcoming parliamentary elections. We reiterate that the right to freely communicate via the Internet is demanded by Article 23 of the Constitution of Bahrain and Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We therefore repeat our demand for the government to immediately end its policy of censoring the Internet for political purposes.
The BCHR additionally calls on bloggers and website owners in Bahrain and around the world to continue highlighting the details of the Bandargate scandal until the government reasonably addresses the allegations. While the local press has completely acquiesced to the gag order, the Internet serves as the only remaining medium through which the government can be prevented from covering up the scandal. We recommend that bloggers refer to the ‘Handbook for Bloggers and Cyber-Dissidents‘, issued by Reporters Sans Frontières, for guidelines of how to blog anonymously and the ethical standards one should adhere to.

Notes

[1] Bahrain blocks websites for violating reporting ban, Reuters, November 1, 2006. See also: Banned ‘blogs’ face legal action, Gulf Daily News, October 31, 2006 and Bahrain clamps down on talks of ‘spy’ allegations, AFP, October 31, 2006.
[2] A collection of press releases and news articles related to the Bandargate scandal can be found here.