NEW YORK (Dispatches) – A United Nations human rights watchdog has called on Bahrain to release and compensate two activists facing death sentences, saying they are being arbitrarily detained.
In July 2020, Bahrain’s highest court upheld death sentences against Mohammed Ramadhan and Husain Moosa for bombing a convoy and killing a police officer, after convictions in December 2014 that human rights groups say were based on confessions extracted through torture.
“Taking into account all the circumstances of the case, particularly the risk of harm to the physical and psychological well-being of Mr. Ramadhan and Mr. Moosa, the appropriate remedy would be to release both men immediately and accord them an enforceable right to compensation and other reparations, in accordance with international law,” the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention said in a report published Thursday and dated May 31.
The Bahrain government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Meanwhile, Human rights groups expressed outrage on Thursday over UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s meeting with Bahrain’s crown prince, who they say heads the Persian Gulf state’s “systematic” use of torture against dissidents.
Johnson met with Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, who was appointed prime minister in November, at Downing Street for an hour-long meeting where they discussed a range of issues - including trade, security, the economy, and Covid-19 travel corridors.
But rights groups slammed the prime minister for failing to make “any mention of human rights” in public statements about the meeting.
Earlier this year, the UN high commissioner for human rights accused Bahrain of being in “violation of international law” over its treatment of prisoners, some of whom are documented to be as young as 13 years old.
The Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (Bird) sent a letter to Johnson and UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab, condemning the failure to raise human rights during his meeting and urging them both “to place human rights at the center of all conversations with the crown prince hereafter and any future relationship between the UK and Bahrain”.
MP Brendan O’Hara and Lord Scriven also sent a letter, this one on behalf of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Democracy and Human Rights in the Persian Gulf, which expressed deep concern at “the marked deterioration in the state of democracy and human rights in Bahrain”.
Jeed Basyouni, from the human rights organization Reprieve, criticized the prime minister for not announcing the visit before it took place, suggesting Johnson had attempted to keep the meeting secret.