Bahrain Mirror: Human rights activist Ibtisam Al-Saegh recounted to Amnesty International details about the torture she was subjected to at the National Security Agency (NSA) building last Friday (May 26, 2017).

Ibtisam Al-Saegh told Amnesty International that she received a phone call on 25 May from the NSA who told her to present herself to the NSA building in Muharraq the following afternoon.

When she arrived, she was immediately blindfolded, and in the subsequent hours, she was beaten all over her body, kicked in the stomach and kept standing for most of the seven hours she was being interrogated.

"They beat me on my nose and they kicked me in the stomach, knowing that I had undergone surgery on my nose and that I was suffering from my colon. I could hear an electric device next to me, which was to scare me. I was made to stand up for most of the time, except for ten minutes when they wanted to eat something. I fainted twice and was woken up with cold water thrown on me. They sat me on a chair only for a few seconds while still interrogating me. I was threatened that my daughter would be raped and that they would bring my husband and torture and electrocute him," Al-Saegh further stated.

She went on to say that the men told me "no one can protect you". She added "They took away my humanity, I was weak prey to them."

During her interrogation, Ibtisam Al-Saegh was questioned about Diraz, where security forces attacked an ongoing protest on 23 May killing five people, and about other human rights defenders she knew, as well as about her participation at the UN Human rights Council in Geneva last March, where she spoke out about violations in Bahrain. She was also told to stop all her human rights activities or she would be further targeted.

Amnesty said that Al-Saegh was released from the NSA at around 11pm in shock and unable to walk properly. She was transferred to hospital where she received treatment for a nervous breakdown.

Amnesty International called on the Bahraini authorities to immediately end the torture and other ill-treatment of human rights defenders and other critics of the government, and to investigate all allegations of torture and other ill-treatment with the intention to bring those responsible to justice through fair trials.

"The state must end all forms of reprisals it is currently using against human rights defenders and government critics, targeted solely for the peaceful exercise of their freedom of expression," the organization expressed.

Amnesty International is gravely concerned that other peaceful critics and human rights defenders, summoned for interrogation by the NSA, are at high risk of torture and other ill-treatment.

There are reports of other human rights and political activists who were summoned to the NSA and may have also been tortured or otherwise ill-treated between 24 and 28 May. Some have since Tweeted that they are stopping their activities.

Amnesty International stated that the torture of human rights defenders, in this instance a woman, is a clear indication that the Bahraini government has stepped up its repression of peaceful critics and human rights defenders, moving from locking them up or banning them from travel, to now resorting to torture in order to force them to halt their activities.

Arabic Version