Reporters Without Borders calls on Bahrain to release Nabeel Rajab
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) says Bahrain’s detention of prominent rights activist Nabeel Rajab is a shameful act which must be rescinded.
“It is outrageous that the Bahraini authorities are holding a human rights defender and are subjecting him to appalling prison conditions just because he used Twitter to provide information,” said the international group on Wednesday.
Earlier, the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, a non-profit, non-governmental organization led by Rajab, announced that a Bahraini court has denied bail for the rights activist.
“We call on them to free Nabeel Rajab and to withdraw all the charges against him,” added the RSF.
Rajab, who has been repeatedly detained for organizing anti-regime demonstrations and publishing posts critical of the ruling dynasty, was pardoned for health reasons last year. However, the 51-year-old campaigner was rearrested last month.
He was briefly hospitalized late last month over health problems, but the court ordered that he remain in custody throughout the trial.
Rajab will be tried over tweets he posted in March 2015 criticizing Manama’s involvement in the deadly Saudi aggression against Yemen and torture at Bahrain’s notorious Jaw Prison.
Earlier this week, 26 rights groups, including Human Rights First and Physicians for Human Rights, released a joint statement calling on Manama to free the rights campaigner.
Bahrain, a close ally of the US in the Persian Gulf region, has seen a wave of anti-regime protests since mid-February 2011.
The Al Khalifah regime is engaged in a harsh crackdown on dissent and widespread discrimination against the country's Shia majority. Scores of people have been killed and hundreds of others injured or arrested in the tiny Persian Gulf state.
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