Demands escalated to form an international committee to document crimes of torture in the prisons of the ruling Khalifah regime in Bahrain against prisoners of conscience and opponents.
The Bahraini opposition bloc in Britain affirmed its full support for the victims of authoritarian torture, which has been the ruling family’s greatest weapon in the face of the oppressed Bahraini people for fifty years.
The bloc said in a statement on the occasion of the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, which falls on Sunday, that the people of Bahrain must stand with the victims of the systematic policy of torture, which has been practised in Bahrain’s prisons for decades, and the rulers refuse to abandon it.
It stressed the need to renew the covenant with the victims of this criminal policy, whose existence the ruling family recently admitted, as one of its human rights institutions claimed that torture had decreased by 70 per cent.
The bloc called on the world, especially the influential parties, to take serious positions to pressure the Bahraini government to stop this degrading treatment, as human rights are considered to cross geographical borders and general humanitarian responsibility.
It stressed the need to intensify the call to investigate all crimes of torture and to form an independent committee with the participation of international experts to document the stories of victims and their suffering, as well as identify those responsible for torture, whether by approving or practising it.
The bloc called for deepening widespread awareness that the crime of torture is prohibited internationally and seeking to prepare lists of the names of the tortured and to prosecute them for the crimes against humanity they committed, which led to the martyrdom of dozens of innocents.
Activists and tweeters had announced the launch of an electronic campaign in Bahrain to demand an end to torture of prisoners of conscience and dissidents in the prisons of the Al-Khalifa regime.
The campaign will be launched next Sunday, June 26, on International Day in Support of Victims of Torture and in solidarity with the tortured political detainees in Bahraini prisons.
An invitation was made to participate in the electronic campaign on my tags: #Stop_torture_in_Bahrain and #Release_Prisoners_Bahrain.
Human rights circles have previously called for the imposition of international deterrent sanctions on officials of the Al-Khalifi regime against the backdrop of systematic torture violations against prisoners of conscience and opponents in Bahrain’s prisons.
The Gulf Center for Human Rights and the Dayton Pierce Glenn Law Firm issued a report entitled: “Accountability for Torture in Bahrain: A Call for Magnificent Sanctions.”
The report focused on the UK’s use and application of a sanctions regime such as the Magnitsky Act against Bahraini officials implicated in torture, particularly the three witnesses interviewed by Dayton Pierce Glenn.
Three former detainees in Bahrain, Ibrahim Al-Dimistani, Muhammad Sultan and Younis Ahmed Sultan, testified and provided evidence of the severe torture they were subjected to at the hands of Bahraini officers led by the Bahraini Ministry of Interior.
The report was prepared with guidance from the Gulf Center for Human Rights, and the scope of the guidance issued by the centre included the investigation of a body of evidence related to allegations of torture and ill-treatment by officials in Bahrain and the analysis of this evidence, as well as consideration of potential mechanisms for accountability.
The report focused on the issue of accountability for gross violations of human rights, particularly the use of torture in detention facilities.
The report concluded that there are accountability mechanisms inside Bahrain, but it stressed that they are ineffective, as there is no evidence that the perpetrators have been effectively punished or deterred, and violations are still continuing.
The report looks at solutions available outside Bahrain, particularly in the United Kingdom, and includes global prosecutions and Magnitsky sanctions.
Although Bahrain is the report’s focus, similar solutions will be applied to perpetrators in the Gulf states and elsewhere.
The report examined the difficulties in achieving successful global prosecutions in the UK and contrasted this with the UK’s Magnitsky Sanctions regime in practice.
It was found that the evidence collected concerning witnesses and by a third party met the requirements for submitting a request to the Minister of Foreign Affairs to consider implementing sanctions against Bahraini Minister of Interior Rashid bin Abdullah bin Ahmed Al Khalifa.
The Gulf Center for Human Rights and the Dayton Pierce Glen Foundation released the report at a parliamentary meeting in the House of Commons in Britain on April 27, 2022.
Salam for Democracy and Human Rights (SALAM DHR) submitted a complaint to the United Nations regarding torture to extract confessions in the prisons of the ruling Khalifa regime in Bahrain.
The organization addressed the continued torture of detainees, especially in pretrial detention to extract confessions, and the practice of subjecting prisoners to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment with complete impunity.
The Bahraini regime practices one of the most heinous practices of torture and the crushing of human rights in the Gulf against its citizens who oppose or violate the regime’s policies.
