Today, Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain (ADHRB) delivered an Oral Statement under Item 3′ General Debate. ADHRB drew attention to the poor prison conditions in Bahrain and there is a culture of impunity among state officials. A letter from Ali Al-Hajee, one of the political prisoners was also read during this intervention.
Click here for the PDF format and please find below the oral statement.
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Mr. President,
We would like to thank the mandates of the Special Procedures for their work and raise concerns about poor conditions in Bahraini prisons as well as ongoing religious discrimination, reprisals, impunity, and police brutality in the prisons. These resent several joint communications on Bahrain shows a disturbing trend of the culture of impunity demonstrated by Bahraini authorities led by minister of interior Sheikh Rashid bin Abdulla Al-Khalifa.
I would like to read a letter we recently received from one of the political prisoners in Bahrain, Ali Al-Hajee:
Mr. President/members of the Human Rights Council,
I am addressing you today from my prison cell in Bahrain after I have been imprisoned for 10 years due to an unfair political trial conducted by the government of Bahrain. I have been through physical and physiological torture by members of the Ministry of Interior despite complaining several times to bodies like the Ombudsman and NIHR; no one was held accountable highlighting the culture of impunity by the government in Bahrain.
Since the pro-democracy uprising in 2011 the government engaged in serious consistent human rights violations like torture, arbitrary detention, extrajudicial killing, enforced disappearance, rape, and reprisal. There is lack of leadership from the highest ruling figure in the country to address these ongoing egregious human rights violations. Therefore, I and thousands of political prisoners in Bahrain call on the Council to hold Bahrain accountable and suspend its current membership of the Human Rights Council till it has released all political prisoners and end the culture of impunity.
Thank you
