Bahrain’s criminal justice system fails to deliver basic accountability and impartial justice, Human Rights Watch said in a report released Wednesday.
Bahrain’s criminal justice system fails to deliver basic accountability and impartial justice, Human Rights Watch said in a report released Wednesday.
The 64-page report, “Criminalizing Dissent, Entrenching Impunity: Persistent Failures of the Bahraini Justice System Since the BICI Report,” slammed the justice system in the Gulf kingdom for sentencing peaceful protesters into long jail terms.
The report found that “more than two years after King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa accepted recommendations of the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI) to free peaceful dissenters and hold abusive officials accountable, Bahrain’s courts play a key role in maintaining the country’s highly repressive political order, routinely sentencing peaceful protesters to long prison terms,” HRW posted on its official website on Wednesday.
However, members of security forces “are rarely prosecuted for unlawful killings, including in detention, and the few convictions have carried extremely light sentences,” the report added.
“A police officer in Bahrain who kills a protester in cold blood or beats a detainee to death might face a sentence of six months or maybe two years, while peacefully calling for the country to become a republic will get you life in prison,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Bahrain’s problem is not a dysfunctional justice system, but rather a highly functional injustice system.”
The report, based on written verdicts and other court documents, revealed the stark contrast between prosecutions of serious human rights violations by security personnel on the one hand and prosecutions for “crimes” based on speech and peaceful assembly-related activities on the other.
The report also sharply contested UK Foreign Office claims that Bahrain has implemented the Commission of Inquiry’s key recommendations and is moving forward on judicial reform.
