Letter to Members of EU and European Parliament Concerning Human Rights in Bahrain

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Dec 11, 2012 Bahrain
[Endorsement Signatures of Bahraini Political Prisoners. Image from bahrainrights.org] [Endorsement Signatures of Bahraini Political Prisoners. Image from bahrainrights.org]

Letter to Members of EU and European Parliament Concerning Human Rights in Bahrain

By : Jadaliyya Reports

[The following letter was issued by the Bahrain Center for Human Rights on 8 December 2012.]

8 December 2012

Honorables
President and members of the European Union
President and members of the European Parliament

Subject: EU to secure respect of human rights in Bahrain


Dear respected members,

We appreciate your stances to support the genuine promotion of human rights in Bahrain. The procrastination and deception policy, adopted by the ruling elite in Bahrain to avoid respecting human rights and fully implementing the BICI and UNHRC, has resulted in further deterioration of the overall stability and social security in the country. Some of these recommendations call for the release of all prisoners of conscience and protesters as well as the independent and impartial prosecution of tortures and perpetrators of ill-treatment of detainees and prisoners.

We, the undersigned, a group of political, social and human rights activists, are examples of prisoners who are serving long sentences of up to life imprisonment, a result of malicious prosecution and unfair court proceedings. The judicial proceedings lacked the basis of fair and impartial trials and were based on draconian laws denounced for nonconformance with the international charters and conventions. The group members are known for their pacifism, public opposition of all forms of corruption and systematic violations of human rights, and persistent strive against despotism in Bahrain. Hence, we have been constantly and maliciously targeted in our personal wellbeing and family welfare and security. Hence we have been subject to ill-treatment and torture during the process of arrest, interrogation, incarceration, prosecution and imprisonment after the commitment of a military court. Moreover, state lead media smear and slander campaign against us has not abated until the time being, 20 months after the crackdown which started in March 17, 2011.

Our group, as well as the sentenced medical doctors’ team, represent two conspicuous examples of individuals and groups subjected to abusive treatment during the unrest since March 2011. It is to be noted that Bahrain has been under state of undeclared martial laws for many months aiming at forcefully suppressing all forms of expression, considered by the regime, dissenting and subversive.

Attached is an appendix covering “Issues of Concerns”, which involve: the continuation of imprisonment of political and human rights activists, the recent unfair judicial proceedings, and the failure to implement the BICI recommendations.

We are concerned that the Bahraini government continued suppression of the persistent popular protests, using excessive force with impunity and protection of law, will lead to extra casualties and eventual collapse of social security. As you are aware, Bahrain was faced, in last May UNHRC convention, with 176 reservations concerning human rights abuses and violations. One of the recommendations, the immediate release of all prisoners of conscience, which our group belongs to, remains unfulfilled. It is our belief that without the full involvement of the international community and renowned organizations like the EU, human rights abuses and deterioration of social security in Bahrain will not cease, but rather escalate. We therefore call for the following steps to help ease the situation and pave the path for tranquility and stability:

1. The immediate and unconditional release of all prisoners of the protests and unrest in Bahrain.
2. The swift and full and genuine execution of BICI and UNHRC recommendations.
3. The termination of all sectarian and smear media campaign against activists.
4. Encourage and support a UNHRC-lead investigation on torture and ill-treatment based on Istanbul Protocols.

We trust that the EU will not spare any initiatives to help maintain peace and stability, safeguarded by genuine respect of human rights in Bahrain.

Thank you and we remain cordially yours,

1. Abdul Wahab Hussain Ahmed: Author and leader in Al-Wafa Current (a political group)
2. Hasan Ali Hasan Mushaima: General Secretary of HAQ Movement of Liberties and Democracy
3. Mohammed Habib Al-Megdad: President of Al-Zahra Orphan Care Society
4. Ebrahim Shareef Al-Sayyed: General Secretary of Waad (National Democratic Action Society)
5. Abduljalil Radhi Al-Megdad: Scholar and social activists
6. Abduljalil Abdulla Al-Singace: Academic, blogger and Head of Human Rights unit in HAQ
7. Saeed Mirza Ahmed Noori: Scholar and social activist
8. Abdulhadi Abdulla Al-Mokhader: Scholar and social activist
9. Abduall Esa Al-Mahroos: Scholar and social and political activist
10. Abdulhadi Abdulla Al-Khawaja: Human rights activist
11. Salah Abdulla Al-Khawaja: Consultant and expert in family affairs
12. Mohammed Ali Radhi: Educationalist and social activist
13. Mohammed Hasan Jawad: Political and social activist

Appendix: Issues of Concern

1. Continued imprisonment and prosecution of political and human rights activists. This act includes all those who exercised their legitimate rights to freedom of expression, gathering and association. The group of political leaders (as dubbed numerously in the BICI report) and the team of doctors and medics represent two typical examples of victims of repression and blatant violations of human rights carried out by different Bahraini security bodies during the suppression of the popular protests since March 17, 2011. Nevertheless, the two groups are not the exhaustive examples subject to various sorts of ill-treatment and human rights violations. Tens of other groups and hundreds of individuals, of different age and gender, were subject to torture and their basic civil liberties were violated because of their exercise of freedom of expression, gathering and association. The Bahraini authorities consider such exercise of rights unlawful crimes punishable by the law and part of a bigger scheme to overthrow the regime and change it by force.

The different sorts of abuses and ill-treatment of activists (political, social and human rights) were documented thoroughly by the BICI. The degrading treatment, carried out by security bodies (The Ministry of Interior, The National Security Apparatus – NSA, The National Guards, and the Bahrain Defense Force – BDF) include: home arrests at dawn, during interrogation, and incarceration, and during, as well as after, the unfair military trials by the army (BDF).

In an appendix at the end of the BICI report, brief statements were collected for all members of the political leaders and that of the medical team. The two groups were examined by a professional forensic team sponsored by the BICI. Moreover in the said report, the political leaders and human rights activists were exemplified and referred to in the nine situations and dubbed with names including “14 political leaders, 14 political detainees, and 14 top political opposition figures”. Such referral in the BICI report contradicts the rhetoric statements by representatives of the Bahraini authorities to the non-existence of political prisoners or prisoners of conscience in Bahrain.

2. The judicial verdicts issued by the Bahrain courts against dissidents, human rights defenders and protestors, include the lack of latitude by the persecution and courts. They have proven to be prejudiced, politicalized and lacking impartiality, independence and the criteria of fair trials. The verdicts issued by the elementary as well as the appeal courts, against the political leaders and other groups were founded mainly on testimonies of “secret sources” of the NSA, whose members have been implicated in torture and ill-treatment of detainees to coerce them to confess on themselves and others. Such illegitimate confessions were used as the basis for indictment. These sorts of confessions were considered by the BICI and the international comenents, void and nullify any judicial ruling. In the case of political leaders and human rights activists, the verdicts were issued by the limitary elementary courts, was upheld by both military and civil appeal courts, contrary to the recommendation of the BICI report for cases to be reviewed, sentences commuted and charges dropped.

It is worth noting that the prisoners and the current prosecutions are based on the same laws denounced for noncompliance with international charters. The Bahraini authorities have repeatedly employed these laws to target dissidents and human rights activists. It includes the “Penal Code”, the counter terrorism code “Protecting the Society from Terror Acts”, and “Meetings, Processions and Gatherings Code”.

3. The BICI report documented the aforesaid and other abuses with conclusive remarks and recommendations, leading figures of the ruling family and the government have frequently declared, in public, their acceptance and adherence to all the conclusions and recommendations. However, local authorities and until this moment, exploited the report and its findings to deceive the international community. The authorities went on detaching itself from their commitments and pledges.

Moreover, and irrespective of the official declarations and statements about executing the BICI recommendations, the authorities worked on emptying many of these recommendations from their genuine contents, redefining some to lose its meaning and bypassed others, under the allegations of progression as well as compliance with the law.

The authorities did not upheld to the requirements to assert fair and just trials during the revision of the verdicts of the unfair military trials including the rejection of proofs based on confessions extracted under duress. Accordingly, hundreds of prisoners and groups, including the 14 political and human rights activists and the medical group, are imprisoned and under prosecution. No independent and neutral commission, formed according to the Istanbul Protocol, was made available to investigate into torture and ill-treatment.

4. The trials and prosecutions continued for political and human rights activists, amidst sustained media provocation and instigation of hatred and sectarian polarizing targeting the activists with slander and insults. The media outlets in Bahrain are state lead and are responsible for social tension and political stall. The authorities have not taken genuine step to ensure neutrality and professionally in the media outlets, as recommended by the BICI.
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Jadaliyya Reports By :
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Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 

[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412