Fri Jun 10, 2011 12:57AM
Saeed al-Shehabi, leader of the Bahrain Freedom Movement
A Bahraini political activist says the regime's decision to put on trial nearly 400 people in military courts for taking part in anti-regime peaceful protests is illegal.
“How can one hold military trials without the martial law, which has already been lifted," Saeed al-Shehabi, leader of the Bahrain Freedom Movement, told Press TV in an interview Thursday night.
“These courts are trying civilian people while they should be tried only in civilian courts as per law,” he said.
“I know many people are being tried for taking part in peaceful demonstrations,” al-Shehabi stated. “So these trials will backfire.”
When asked about a UN report that said Bahrain has accepted a UN mission in the country to examine reports of human rights violations during protests, Shehabi said that the UN has failed in its test and it has so far done nothing despite several complaints from international human rights organizations of violations committed by the ruling regime.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, has been urged by Bahraini activists to send a commission to Bahrain, but nothing has happened, the activist said.
Bahrain's Saudi-backed Al Khalifa regime is under fire by international human rights organizations for its brutal repression of the anti-government protests.
“Thousands of anti-government protesters have lost their lives, hundreds have been wounded, hundreds more have been detained and tortured, hundreds have been dismissed from their jobs for taking part in peaceful demonstrations and many have gone missing since the Manama regime began its crackdown in mid-February,” he said.
“The least they (UN) can do is to send a fact-finding delegation,” Shehabi said, adding that Al Khalifa family had earlier blocked rights delegations “to set foot on Bahraini soil.”
FTP/AGB/MGH
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