Search Results

BBC is reporting: “Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters have blocked a major motorway in Bahrain ahead of Sunday’s F1 Grand Prix in the Gulf kingdom. Some in the crowd carried banners with the slogan: ‘Don’t race on our blood.’ The rally along Budaiya Highway followed a night of heavy clashes between demonstrators and security forces. Activists have demanded that F1 bosses cancel the race due to Bahrain’s poor human rights record. The race which was first run in Bahrain in 2004 was cancelled two years ago following the forcible clearance of an iconic Manama landmark, Pearl Roundabout. In the unrest that followed more than 50 people died, hundreds were arrested and thousands dismissed from their jobs.”

REEM KHALIFA, reemkhalifa17 at gmail.com, @Reem_Khalifa
Khalifa just wrote the AP piece: “‘Don’t Race on our Blood’: Protesters Try to Put the Brakes on Bahrain’s Grand Prix.”

SAID YOUSIF AL-MUHAFDA, s.yousif1982 at gmail.com, @saidyousif
Al-Muhafda is with the Bahrain Center for Human Rights. He was recently jailed for a month for tweeting about protests in Bahrain. The president of the group, Nabeel Rajab, continues to be jailed by the regime. Al-Muhafda just wrote the piece: “Crackdown Intensifies Before F1 in Bahrain” for the Huffington Post, which states: “The United States is one of the countries supporting the Bahraini regime despite the Obama Administration’s claims to be on the side of democracy and human rights. Why does the administration often stay so silent on the situation in Bahrain and not announce its support for the legitimate demands of the Bahrainis for peaceful protest and self-determination? We know Bahrain hosts a major U.S. military base. That is why it is so important for them to speak up for us and to say that we are people who deserve democracy. Bahrainis want to enjoy it as U.S. citizens do. We want to express our opinions and to elect our officials. Our unelected prime minister has not been changed for 42 years, unlike the United States, where Americans practice their right to elect a President every four years.

“We are gradually being killed in Bahrain by international silence for our crime of demanding self-determination. As the F1 race commences, we ask that you look beyond the track. We ask that you look into the streets of Bahrain, where those who want democracy are in a race against time for their lives and freedom.” Also, See New York Times piece: “Bahrain Jails Activist for Covering Protests on Twitter.”

HUSAIN ABDULLA, mohajer12@comcast.net
Abdulla is director of Americans for Democracy and Human Rights in Bahrain.

Further background from Human Rights Watch: “Bahrain: F1 Ignores Rights Abuses Ahead of Race.” Also, “GCC Force ‘Plans Headquarters in Bahrain.’” Video of recent protests.

REEM KHALIFA, [email], @Reem_Khalifa
Khalifa just wrote the AP piece “Clashes mark Bahrain’s Second Uprising Anniversary,” which states: “Security forces in Bahrain clashed on Thursday with anti-government protesters in street battles that left at least one boy dead amid high tensions on the second anniversary of the uprising in the Gulf nation, activists said.

“The demonstrators also included groups chanting against talks aimed at easing the Arab Spring-inspired unrest in the country, showing the deep divisions even among opposition factions over whether to negotiate or escalate the unrest.

“Bahrain’s Shiite majority is seeking a greater political voice in the strategic Sunni-ruled kingdom, which is home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet.

“More than 55 people have been killed in the two-year unrest, which began with massive marches on Feb. 14, 2011. Some activists place the death toll higher.

“The latest death was a 16-year-old boy killed by police … early Thursday in the mainly Shiite village of Dih, west of the capital, Manama, said Yousef al-Muhafedha, a rights activist.”

MARYAM AL-KHAWAJA, [email], @MARYAMALKHAWAJA
Al-Khawaja acting President of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, and co-director of the Gulf Center for Human Rights. She was a guest on “Democracy Now!” this morning.

See also by Jim Lobe: “U.S. Urged to Lean Harder on Bahrain’s Ruling Family.”

The Obama administration is hosting Bahraini Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa in Washington just as the Bahraini regime is vowing a harsher crackdown on anti-government protesters. Democracy Now reported this morning, “Appearing with al-Khalifa at the State Department, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton failed to directly mention the repression of protests, referring only to Bahrain’s ‘internal issues.'”

Secretary Clinton stated: “Bahrain is a valued ally of the United States. We partner on many important issues of mutual concern to each of our nations and to the regional and global concerns as well. I’m looking forward to a chance to talk over with His Royal Highness a number of the issues both internally and externally that Bahrain is dealing with and have some better understanding of the ongoing efforts that the government of Bahrain is undertaking. So again, His Royal Highness, welcome to the United States.” See video

Clinton’s comments came one day after the Bahraini government vowed to escalate its crackdown on anti-government demonstrators. Speaking to Reuters, a Bahraini government spokesman said: “We are looking into the perpetrators and people who use print, broadcast and social media to encourage illegal protest and violence around the country. If applying the law means tougher action, then so be it.” The warning came days after the arrest of the prominent Bahraini human rights activist Nabeel Rajab, who has been featured on IPA news releases. In a statement, Amnesty International declared Rajab a “prisoner of conscience” and called for his immediate release. Another prominent activist, Abdulhadi Alkhawaja, has been on a hunger strike for three months protesting his life imprisonment.

NADA ALWADI, alwadi.nada at gmail.com, @bentalwadi
Alwadi is a Bahrani journalist based in D.C.

Note: Alwadi is being joined next week in Washington, D.C. by representatives of the Arab NGO Network for Development, including nonprofits and civil society groups from Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Tunisia, Yemen and other Arab countries. For more information including arranging interviews, contact Ryme Katkhouda, rymepmc at gmail.com.

GARETH PORTER, porter.gareth50 at gmail.com
American and Iranian negotiators are scheduled to meet this weekend in Istanbul regarding Iran’s nuclear program. Porter is an investigative journalist and historian specializing in U.S. national security policy. He just wrote the piece “U.S.-Israel Deal to Demand Qom Closure Threatens Nuclear Talks.”

REEM KHALIFA, reem.khalifa at alwasatnews.com, @Reem_Khalifa
Today, AP is reporting “Formula One’s governing body says the Bahrain Grand Prix will go ahead as planned,” see: “Human Rights Abuses Aside, Formula 1 Racers Head to Bahrain.”

InterPress Service reported earlier this week “White House Expresses Growing Concern Over Bahrain.”

Khalifa is a noted independent journalist in Bahrain who has written for the AP and other outlets. Today, she reports on large protests including 10,000 people attending a funeral of a citizen journalist. She also reports that the Bahraini government is resorting to weapons they have not used since last year and protesters are denouncing the U.S. and Saudi governments as well as the Bahraini monarchy. Khalifa is scheduled to be interviewed by The Real News today.

MOHAMMAD ALI NAQUVI, alinaquvi at yahoo.com
Ali Naquvi is an attorney and activist with the American Council for Freedom in Bahrain. He said today: “The protests today show that the demands of the Bahrani people have not been met. With the courage of Mr. Abdulhadi al-Khawaja’s hunger strike, now over 60 days, the morale of the people continues to stay high. Even though the Formula One association says that they are going ahead with the race, many individual teams have expressed concern.”

ALEX MAIN, via Dan Beeton, beeton at cepr.net
Main is senior associate for international policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research. He just wrote the piece “Obama in Cartagena: No Change, Dwindling Hope,” which states: “Whether on Cuba policy, ‘free trade,’ the ‘war on drugs’ or relations with left-wing governments in South America, the administration’s current policies are nearly indistinguishable from those of Bush. As a result, Obama’s reception in Cartagena is likely to be lukewarm at best; and the Summit of the Americas itself may well be seen as increasingly irrelevant by most of Latin America and the Caribbean.”

SANHO TREE, stree at igc.org
Director of the Drug Policy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, Tree said today: “As the violence caused by drug prohibition threatens governments throughout the region, the demand for ending prohibition will intensify. Previously, it had been only retired politicians and officials who spoke openly of their views. Now, sitting heads of state are joining the discussion.” See a recent interview here.

HUWAIDA ARRAF, huwaida.arraf at gmail.com
RADHIKA SAINATH, radhika.sainath at gmail.com
Arraf and Sainath are lawyers and human rights activists who, as part of the Witness Bahrain initiative, spent a week in Bahrain before being deported over the weekend. The two of them are now in New York City and were on “Democracy Now!” this morning “U.S.-Backed Bahraini Forces Arrest and Deport Two American Peace Activists Acting as Human Rights Observers.”

The group Witness Bahrain just posted a petition on its website: “The Obama administration is currently moving forward with a new set of arms sales to Bahrain despite the well-documented, egregious human rights violations perpetrated by the government against pro-democracy protesters over the past year. Since the start of Bahrain’s ongoing revolution on February 14, 2011, U.S.-manufactured and supplied weapons, including teargas, Humvees and Apache helicopters have been used by the Bahraini government to violently attack civilians. It is time to stop supplying Bahrain with the tools to kill and repress its people.

“Despite congressional opposition to a $53 million dollar arms sale to Bahrain, the Obama Administration is pushing through the sale using a legal loophole that would allow him to avoid notifying Congress and the public by breaking up the sales into small packages of under $1 million each. …”

NABEEL RAJAB, nabeel.rajab at gmail.com
Rajab is president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights and is regularly tweeting.

ROBERT NAIMAN, naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
Naiman is policy director at Just Foreign Policy and just wrote the piece “What I Learned at the Airport in Bahrain,” which states: “When I came to Bahrain, it certainly wasn’t with the intention of spending my whole time in the country in the airport. I wanted to see what was going on in the country, not to see what was going on in the airport. But the Bahrain authorities would not let me enter the country. At this writing, it’s 5 p.m. local time. My flight got in at 2:15 a.m. I have been informed that the Director of Immigration has decided that I shall not have a visa to enter Bahrain…”

AP is reporting: “Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters in Bahrain are streaming toward a site they seek to occupy for the one-year anniversary of their uprising in the Gulf kingdom.”

The Bahrani regime has been denying visas to media and human rights workers ahead of the anniversary of the start of the uprising.

NABEEL RAJAB,[currently in Bahrain, eight hours ahead of ET] nabeel.rajab at gmail.com
HUWAIDA ARRAF, [also in Bahrain] huwaida.arraf at gmail.com
Rajab is president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights. Arraf, a U.S. citizen, is with Witness Bahrain, a new initiative that released the following statement: “‘Witness Bahrain‘ is a group of international observers, primarily from the United States, who have responded to the call of Bahraini human rights activists to witness their revolution, stand with them at protests, in hospitals and in villages, and to tell the world what they see. The government of Bahrain has denied entry to a number of prominent journalists and human rights workers in the lead-up to the one-year anniversary of the massive and ongoing pro-democracy movement.

“People here fear that the government of Bahrain’s attempt to keep out foreign observers signals an impending escalation of violence. As such, our presence here is all the more crucial. In the coming days and weeks, Witness Bahrain will stand with people taking to the streets to demand democracy, equality and respect for human rights. Witness Bahrain will also maintain a presence in villages active in pro-democracy protests which are being subjected to night raids, tear-gassing and other attacks by the police. We call on the Bahraini government to refrain from attacking peaceful protesters; however, should the government choose to continue using violence, we will be present to witness.”

HUSAIN ABDULLA, mohajer12 at comcast.net
Abdulla is director of Americans for Democracy and Human Rights in Bahrain. He is has been involved in the initiative as well.

Update: U.S. Citizens Arrested in Bahrain during Peaceful Protest: Huwaida Arraf & Radhika Sainath in Police Custody

Still from video of Bahraini state oppression, via Maryam Alkhawaja's Twitter feed

The Wall Street Journal reports: “President Barack Obama will meet with the crown prince of Bahrain at the White House on Tuesday, an administration official said. But in a show of how delicate relations with the U.S. ally have become, the sit-down is not officially on the president’s schedule.”

HUSAIN ABDULLA, mohajer12 at comcast.net
Abdulla is director of Americans for Democracy and Human Rights in Bahrain. He said today: “There will be no news conference so there will likely be no pictures together, but the reality is that Obama is meeting Salman al-Khalifa. While he’s been depicted as the more enlightened element of the ruling family, the fact is that he is the head of the military and it is escalating its killing of protesters as the regime escalates a crackdown, jailing most of the opposition.

“In his Mideast speech last month, Obama said that the U.S. is ‘committed to [Bahrain’s] security.’ That seems to mean that the U.S. will continue to back the despotic al-Khalifa regime, though they will try to come up with a phony political process. And this isn’t just about Bahrain. If Bahrain makes real democratic progress, it will spur movements in the other Gulf monarchies.”

RICHARD SOLLOM, via Megan Prock,  mprock at phrusa.org
Sollom is deputy director of Physicians for Human Rights and was recently in Bahrain, which was invaded by Saudi Arabia on March 14 to help the monarchy put down protesters. Sollom is co-author of the new report, “Do No Harm: A Call for Bahrain to End Systematic Attacks on Doctors and Patients.”

RICHARD SOLLOM, via Megan Prock, mprock at phrusa.org, bahrain.phrblog.org
Sollom is deputy director of Physicians for Human Rights and was recently in Bahrain, which was invaded by Saudi Arabia on March 14 to help the monarchy put down protesters. Sollom is co-author of the new report, “Do No Harm: A Call for Bahrain to End Systematic Attacks on Doctors and Patients.”

He said today: “The government authorities are systematically abducting and disappearing medical personnel for simply having given medical care to protesters who were hurt by government forces. … We documented deaths in custody due to torture, we documented severe abuse, including torture of patients inside the hospitals. …

“People were forced into making false confessions: that they were instructed by the Iranian government to lead these protests, to carry weapons, that they received military training from Iran. These ‘confessions’ were apparently videotaped. I wouldn’t be surprised if we started seeing some of these ‘confessions’ on TV.”

The Bahrain and Saudi regimes are close U.S. allies. Sollom said: “The [Obama] administration needs to speak up on this issue forcefully. … Since the Saudi troops arrived, the violations have increased. … In my 20 years of looking at violations of medical neutrality and violations of human rights in times of war, I’ve not seen such egregious violations.”

See interview with Sollom:  democracynow.org

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

A source in Bahrain who wishes to remain anonymous for their personal safety told the Institute of Public Accuracy this afternoon: “The regime has just arrested Lin Noueihed of Reuters and some other reporters. [Noueihed’s last piece]

“Other countries are getting rid of their emergency laws, while Bahrain is imposing a new martial law. Things are incredibly tense. The regime is saying it wants a ‘cleansing operation’ — some Saudi and Kuwaiti media are using this term as well. The state media in Bahrain are continuing to be incredibly sectarian, creating enmity. Other media are being seriously intimidated, some have been beaten. Al-Jazeera is incredibly silent. I fear there could be a civil war and I fear it could spread. In this small country, 20 peaceful protesters have been killed and, according to the opposition, 100 people are missing and hundreds have been detained by the regime.

“We need serious help. The UN should at least meet to discuss what his happening here. The Saudis have moved into Bahrain and are interfering in one way or another in every Arab country. They don’t want positive developments in Tunisia and Egypt to spread to other countries.”

HUSAIN ABDULLA
Abdulla is director of Americans for Democracy and Human Rights in Bahrain. He said today: “There are extensive protests throughout Bahrain. It’s difficult to get one large protest in the central square because the regime has broken them up. The Saudi troops are still there of course, but getting them out has become a rallying cry for the protesters. The regime is using U.S. tear gas, weapons and Apache helicopters. Sen. Patrick Leahy is pressuring the Pentagon to make a determination about whether this violates U.S. law, using U.S. weapons to repress people. Al-Jazeera, and especially Al-Jazeera Arabic is incredibly quiet about the protests, they seem to only be for protests far away from Qatar [where Al-Jazeera is based].” See interview with The Real News

For Twitter pics and updates: #feb14, @MazenMahdi

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

Reuters reports: “Two men were killed and more than 200 people wounded in clashes in Bahrain on Tuesday, a hospital source said.” Extremely graphic video of Bahraini protester in hospital: youtube.com

HUSAIN ABDULLA
Abdulla is director of Americans for Democracy and Human Rights in Bahrain. He said today: “It’s obvious that the Saudi and Bahraini regimes are cynically exploiting the world’s grief over the tragedy in Japan. They hope few are noticing that Saudi forces moved into the small nation of Bahrain yesterday to back the autocratic regime and attack the pro-democracy movement. Today, the King of Bahrain declared martial law and attacked protesters, hundreds have been wounded. At least two have been killed, one by Saudi forces, another by Bahrani regime forces. They have even attacked a hospital. Sec. of Defense Robert Gates was just in Bahrain. The U.S. has 6,000 soldiers in Bahrain. The U.S. is in a position to put a stop to these atrocities now — they are escalating and unless stopped will likely lead to a total massacre.”

TOBY C. JONES, @tobycraigjones
Jones is an assistant professor of history at Rutgers University and author of the book “Desert Kingdom: How Oil and Water Forged Modern Saudi Arabia.” He is regularly in touch with people in Bahrain.

REEM KHALIFA
Khalifa is senior editor for diplomatic affairs at Al Wasat in Bahrain, one of the few independent media outlets in Bahrain.

CHRISTOPHER DAVIDSON, @dr_davidson
A scholar in Middle East politics at Durham University, Davidson‘s books include Power and Politics in the Persian Gulf Monarchies. He recently wrote the piece “Lords of the Realm: The wealthy, unaccountable monarchs of the Persian Gulf have long thought themselves exempt from Middle East turmoil. No longer.”

Video of protesters marching on Saudi embassy: youtube.com
Fleeing attack: youtube.com

On Twitter: @OnlineBahrain

For more online resources: accuracy.org/uprisings

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167