Americans for Democracy and Human Rights in Bahrain (ADHRB) is pleased to announce the release of: A Follow-Up Report on Bahrain’s UPR Second Cycle: The Deteriorating Human Rights Situation in Bahrain.
On 6 July 6 2012, the member States of the United Nations Human Rights Council submitted 176 recommendations to the Government of Bahrain as part of Bahrain’s second 4-year cycle of its Universal Periodic Review of Human Rights (UPR). In October 2012, the Bahrain government accepted 158 of these recommendations, either in part or in full, which cover a range of issues from the advancement of labor and women’s rights to criminal justice, media and press freedom, and abandoning restrictions on human rights defenders.
The Bahrain government’s acceptance of the recommendations was welcomed by the international community as a means of reenergising a process of reform and reconciliation in the country. Unfortunately, more than a year since the government’s acceptance of the UPR’s recommendations, this second chance has turned into yet another missed opportunity.
A Follow-Up Report on Bahrain’s UPR Second Cycle finds that Bahrain has failed to fully implement any of the 176 recommendations of its Second Cycle UPR. Indeed, ADHRB finds that only two of the twenty-three areas that this report addresses have seen any level of meaningful progress. Furthermore, while technical measures have been taken to meet the requirements of a majority of the recommendations, there has been no perceived progress towards resolving the problems the recommendations were intended to address.
In the event that the Government of Bahrain continues to disregard its commitments to implementing the UPR recommendations, the international community must increase its efforts to shine a light on the human rights abuses that persist in Bahrain. We hope that the international community will continue to encourage the Bahrain government to implement reforms as a means of building confidence and establishing trust in order to create an environment conducive to holding a national dialogue, as this remains the only viable means of bringing about peace, security and prosperity for people of Bahrain.
