Bahrain urged to end Rajab harassment

Sat Dec 11, 2010

An international human rights group has called on Bahrain's government to stop "harassment" of prominent Bahraini rights defender Nabeel Rajab.

Rajab, the head of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, was detained for about an hour by national security agents on December 2 upon his departure to Greece through Bahrain International Airport.

"Bahrain's leaders repeatedly insist that the government respects human rights, but Nabeel Rajab's treatment tells another story," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch (HRW).

"The government should make clear to the security forces that the harassment of human rights defenders needs to stop immediately," Stork said.

HRW also asked Manama to "return any information illegally copied" from Rajab's laptop computer and mobile phone.

"The officers also forcibly took the computer and an iPod belonging to his son and carried them, along with the phone, into a nearby closed room for approximately half an hour. When the computer was returned, it was on and showing the computer's "systems" screen, indicating that information may have been downloaded or copied," the rights group said.

Rajab has been the target of the Bahraini government's continuous harassment for years and at different levels.

The incident is one of many targeting human rights activists in Bahrain.

Bahrain has put on trial 23 opposition activists detained on charges of forming an illegal organization and plotting to overthrow the government.

The detained opposition activists have had almost no access to their lawyers, who were only allowed to see their clients when they were brought before the public prosecutor about two weeks after their arrest and once again during the first trial session.

Some of the defendants said they were subjected to torture or other ill-treatment, their attorneys said.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/154956.html.