Officer killed in Bahrain jailbreak

Authorities say raid on prison was an act of terrorism

A gang of armed men attacked a prison in Bahrain yesterday, killing a police officer and freeing several convicted inmates in what Manama’s interior ministry described as a terrorist act.

“An armed attack on the Jau reform and rehabilitation centre resulted in the death of policeman Abdul Salam Saif and the escape of a number of inmates convicted of terrorist crimes,” the ministry said.

It did not provide an exact number of those who had escaped or identify them but said authorities were searching for them.

Police yesterday set up or reinforced roadblocks near Shiite villages outside the capital, witnesses said.

Thousands of mainly Shiite Bahrainis are in the country’s prisons on charges ranging from participating in antigovernment protests to armed attacks on security forces inside Bahrain.

A court in January last year sentenced 57 men to 15- year jail terms each for taking part in a 2015 riot inside Jau prison, which is located to the south of the capital.

In June, 17 prisoners broke out of Al Hadd jail on the island of Muharraq east of Manama, but the authorities recaptured 11 of them the following day after a manhunt. Bahrain quelled a wave of mass demonstrations in 2011 but has continued to face occasional protests, mostly by majority Shiites demanding reforms and a bigger share in running the island state, which is wedged between regional rivals and military powers Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Shiites complain of discrimination by the Sunni-led monarchy, a charge the government denies.