Bahraini opposition warns of more gaps between the royal government and the protesting people.
 Sheikh Ali Salem - Bahrain's opposition leader |
Sheikh Ali Salem warned against Bahrain being used for a proxy war between rival regional superpowers Iran and Saudi Arabia.
"We urge Iran not to meddle in Bahraini internal affairs," he told a press conference, also demanding the withdrawal of Saudi-led Gulf troops deployed in the kingdom in mid-March to help quash the peaceful protests.
"We demand Saudi Arabia withdraw the Peninsula Shield forces," he said.
Twenty-four people at least, four of them police, were killed in a month of unrest, Bahrain's Interior Minister Rashed bin Abdullah Al-Khalifa said on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Bahrain's foreign minister said his country, slammed over use of deadly force, feared its protests could spark sectarian conflict in other Gulf states, in an interview published Wednesday.
 Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmad Al-Khalifa |
Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmad Al-Khalifa also renewed accusations of the majority state kingdom ruled by his royal family that Lebanon's Hezbollah was "training" regime opponents.
"There have been sectarian tensions everywhere" for centuries, he told the Arab newspaper Al-Hayat. "Bahrain was afraid sectarian confrontations would break out not only in Bahrain but in all other regions."
In mid-March, Bahrain's monarchy, backed by military forces from neighboring KSA and the UAE, cracked on four weeks of protests in the kingdom.
On Friday, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki warned that military intervention in Bahrain by its neighbors in the Gulf risked a sectarian war in the region.
