Bahrain continues to suppress all forms of dissent
Memory of 2011 protests is all but extinguished, modern-day activists say
A decade after demonstrators massed in Bahrain’s capital to call for the downfall of their government in 2011, authorities continue to suppress all signs of dissent. Activists behind those turbulent days say the memory of the protests that threatened the Sunni monarchy’s grip on power is all but extinguished.
But many live with the consequences.
“That was the start of the dark era,” said Jawad Fairooz, an exiled former leader of the now outlawed Al-Wefaq Shiite political party, who was stripped of his nationality for his political work in 2012.
Although many activists and protesters have escaped into exile or been imprisoned, the threat of dissent persists in this tiny kingdom with a majorityShiite population off the eastern coast of Saudi Arabia.
In contrast to neighbouring Gulf Arab monarchies, low-level unrest has plagued Bahrain over recent years. Police have been out in force in city streets over the past week, residents say, taking no chances on renewed
demonstration.
A website for the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry, commissioned by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, that had hosted an independent report on the 2011 protests and the government crackdown that ended them, went mysteriously offline before it was restored Thursday. The government described it as a “technical glitch,” without elaborating.
For weeks beginning on Feb. 14, 2011, thousands thronged streets across Bahrain, emboldened and energized by pro-democracy protests roiling Egypt, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen. Bahrain’s protests were organized primarily by the nation’s Shiites
seeking greater political rights in the Persian Gulf state, which is a key Western ally and home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet.
“It was overwhelming,” recalled Nazeeha Saeed, a reporter at the time for a French TV news channel, describing the heady days in Pearl Roundabout, the symbolic centre of the capital, Manama, later bulldozed by authorities. “I’d never seen anything like it. People forgot we were a Persian Gulf kingdom supported by powerful monarchies.”
Soon, Saeed said, everything went horribly wrong. Security forces tried to disperse the sitin, responding to protests with torrents of tear gas, rubber bullets and in some cases live fire.
Police shot a protester in the head just 20 metres in front of her. She said she was detained and beaten for telling foreign journalists what she saw.
A decade on, activists inside Bahrain and in exile say their country is far less free than it was in 2011. Portraying criticism of its rule as an Iranian plot to undermine the country, the government has accelerated its crackdown. Bahrain blamed Iran for stirring up the 2011 protests as well, though the report by Bassiouni and other experts found no evidence of that.
In the time since 2011, authorities have targeted not only Shiite political groups and religious leaders, but also human rights activists, journalists and online opponents. Mass trials have become commonplace. Political parties have been dismantled. Independent news gathering on the island has become nearly impossible. Meanwhile, there have been sporadic, low-level attacks on police and other targets by Shiite militant groups.
“Since 2011 we have only moved backward,” a former journalist who declined to be identified for fear of reprisals, said. “Now, the only meaning of ‘opposition’ in Bahrain is to try to document your friends’ arrests.”