AFP/Dubai
Bahraini activist Zainab al-Khawaja tweets updates via her Smartphone during a protest outside the offices of the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI) in Manama yesterday. The demonstrators were protesting over reports that BICI head Mahmoud Cherif Bassiouni had in an interview described rights violations as acts of individuals rather than being systematic. A BICI statement said the commission’s work was ongoing and that it had not prejudged anything
An independent commission of inquiry into the unrest in Bahrain said yesterday that 137 detainees have been released to await trial in civilian courts, including two former Shia MPs.
“We are immensely pleased that these detainees have been released ... They can now enjoy the holy month of Ramadan with their families,” Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry chairman Mahmud Sherif Bassiouni said in a statement.
Bassiouni said the 137 were being freed on the order of the attorney general.
“The investigative team have made a number of visits to prisons, detention centres and police stations, and hospitals, many of which have been unannounced,” the Egyptian professor said.
“We are continuing our investigation of reports of mistreatment and torture, and we will soon have a team of forensic medical experts from outside the country come in to look at all individuals who have complained of physical mistreatment and torture.”
Among those allowed to go home are two former MPs from Bahrain’s largest Shia formation, the Islamic National Accord Association (Al Wefaq), Matar Matar and Jawad Fayrouz, who were arrested at gunpoint in early May.
The men were being tried by a national safety court for having allegedly called for regime change and spreading rumours linked to the pro-democracy street protests in Bahrain in January and February.