Bahrain Mirror: Some of the dearest foreign "friends"of the current United States President Donald Trump are authoritarian brutes at home, violating human rights that most Americans claim to hold dear, stressed the American Conservative.

The Washington-based bi-monthly magazine highlighted, in an article by Doug Bandow, that one of the worst cases is Bahrain, the Shia-majority kingdom that hosts the U.S. Fifth Fleet in its capital Manama. "The monarchy there has long favored the minority Sunnis, establishing a system that some critics have compared to South African apartheid."

"In 2011, the Arab Spring yielded a vibrant Bahraini democracy movement led by the oppressed majority Shia that embarrassed the autocratic kingdom. The regime had to rely on Saudi troops to brutally crush all opposition. Observed the New York Times: ‘Bahrain's royal family has used tanks, riot police officers, sweeping arrests and tight censorship to thwart demands for democracy among the Shiite Muslim majority.'"

Bandow further stated that a supposed dialogue with critics proved to be but a façade, as criticism led to arrest and prison. "Some 14 death sentences were handed down for alleged "terrorist" offenses. Scores of opponents were stripped of their citizenship. Some critics were banned from traveling abroad, while others disappeared, later to end up before military courts. No one was safe."

He also noted that the Bahraini regime brought in Pakistani and Syrian Sunnis to staff its burgeoning security agencies, also seeking to attract Sunni immigrants, fast-tracking their citizenship applications to diminish the Shia population's edge (70 to 75 percent of total Bahrainis). "Manama even launched a campaign to destroy Shia mosques, calling them ‘illegal buildings.'"

"At least the Obama administration evidenced some discomfort at the vicious crackdown," he said, adding that "although the State Department still expresses concern from time to time, President Trump has ignored the repression. Indeed, last spring the president, while meeting Bahrain's ruler Sheikh Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, said: ‘Our countries have a wonderful relationship together.' While there had been past tensions, he allowed, ‘there won't be strain with this administration.'"

The American Conservative article further lists the Bahraini regime's latest rights violations, pointing out that the latest assault on human rights is a five-year sentence imposed on Nabeel Rajab, president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights. It also notes that "last year the al-Khalifa government targeted the family of human rights activist Sayed Al-Wadaei, who had been stripped of his citizenship and forced into exile."

Repression has been a constant of Bahraini policy, Bandow stressed, adding that abuses by security forces continue and remain generally immune from punishment. This situation is "impossible to reconcile with even minimal standards of justice," noted HRW.

He goes on to say that torture is government policy. The BICI reported that security agencies "followed a systematic practice of physical and psychological mistreatment, which in many cases amounted to torture, with respect to a large number of detainees in their custody."

In his article, he also says that earlier this year Freedom House rated Bahrain "Not Free," near the bottom internationally for civil liberties and political rights, stressing that even the US State Department cannot deny the obvious, as its latest 47-page human rights report cites "limitations on citizens' ability to choose their government peacefully, including due to the government's ability to close arbitrarily or create registration difficulties for organized political societies; restrictions on free expression, assembly, and association; and lack of due process in the legal system, including arrest without warrants or charges and lengthy pretrial detentions-used especially in case against opposition members and political or human rights activists."

Bandow asserts that backing repressive regimes is costly: the majority of Bahrainis cannot help but see America as aiding their oppressors. "And Washington's tolerance for brutal dictatorships undermines its criticism of Iran and other authoritarian governments."

"At the very least the U.S. should eschew the close embrace and rhetoric of friendship. More fundamentally, Washington should rethink the interventionist policies that force it to rely upon such authoritarian regimes."

Concluding his article, Doug Bandow stresses that in the meantime, Trump should call up his buddy the king and urge the release of Nabeel Rajab, adding that if the president is going to pal around with assorted dictators, he might as well achieve something positive for his trouble. "Freeing a human rights hero would be a good start."

Arabic Version