Saudi-backed Al-Khalifa Regime Continues Torturing Inmates
07 January 2012 – Islamic Invitation Turkey

Fresh reports of the torture of an 18-year old student in detention are yet another blow to Bahrain’s promises of reform, Amnesty International said.

Independent observers reported that the Bahraini police have subjected Hassan ‘Oun to torture, including beatings and threats of rape after his arrest in Manama on 3 January.

“As such horrendous cases of human rights abuse keep piling up, the Bahraini authorities’ promises of change ring ever more hollow,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

Hassan’s family has told Amnesty International that he was interrogated about his contact with the Bahrain Center for Human Rights.

The student had told the Center about being tortured by police during a previous 2011 arrest, following his involvement in anti-government protests.

“We are concerned that Hassan ‘Oun may have been targeted again for arrest because he dared to report police abuses,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui.

According to family members, Hassan told his lawyer that the police had forced him to stand for about 11 hours, and that he had been beaten on his feet with a hose and threatened with rape.

Hassan’s lawyer and other witnesses have reportedly seen signs of torture on his body, and that one of his legs is swollen from injury.

Hassiba Hadj Sahroui called for immediate investigations in to the case, and also called for Hassan’s immediate release.

After being held in a police station for a day, Hassan was questioned at the Public Prosecutor’s Office (PPO) on 4 January.

The PPO extended his detention for 45 days pending investigation, under illegal public gathering charges. Hassan was then transferred to the Dry Dock Prison in Manama.

His family have not been allowed to see him.

Nearly a year on since the start of the crackdown on anti-government demonstrations at Manama’s Pearl Roundabout in 2011, scores of health workers, opposition and human rights activists, teachers and others are still facing trials or serving prison sentences. …more

Sales and Strategy
07 January, 2012 – Editorial – NYT

In the closing days of last year, the Obama administration announced multibillion-dollar arms sales packages to Iraq and Saudi Arabia, including advanced fighter jets, tanks, helicopters and an array of smaller weapons.

A case can be made for these two packages. The Pentagon needs to strengthen strategic partnerships in the region and fortify allies — and oil producers — vulnerable to Iranian pressure. These sales help create jobs at home and offset the dollar drain from oil imports. Still, we are uneasy about the timing and the terms. In its haste to complete these deals, the White House may have forfeited leverage it needs to nudge both governments toward less destructive policies.

With United States troops now out of Iraq, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki is spurning Washington’s repeated pleas for national reconciliation and power sharing, endangering Iraq’s democracy and stability. In his latest move, Mr. Maliki, a Shiite, has grabbed full control of the country’s key security forces — and empowered Shiite militants — angering Iraq’s Sunni Arabs and Kurds and moderate Shiites.

This seems an odd moment to sell him $11 billion of American-made military equipment, including fighter jets, battle tanks, cannons and armored personnel carriers — the same kind of weapons that Saddam Hussein once used against Iraqi Kurds and Shiites. Before closing the deal, Washington should have sought firm guarantees that Mr. Maliki would do a lot more to share power and resources — and drop his threat to walk away from the American-brokered power-sharing arrangement with the more inclusive Iraqiya bloc, winner of the most seats in the 2010 elections.

Washington should also have bargained harder with the Saudis before signing off on $30 billion of advanced F-15 jet fighters as part of a multiyear $60 billion arms deal. The idea is to strengthen Saudi competence and confidence against Iran, which poses a serious threat to all of its neighbors. That threat is more likely to come from terrorism and subversion than from Iran’s sanctions-weakened air force, and the best-known use of Saudi troops abroad recently was to help suppress democracy demonstrations in Bahrain.

There are ways to mitigate these dangers. The fighter jets and some of the other sophisticated weapons are not scheduled for delivery until several years from now. And the pilots flying them will require training in the United States. If it appears that American-made weapons are being misused against domestic political opponents, deliveries can and should be held up and training programs suspended. …more

Naperville, IL — (SBWIRE) — 01/09/2012 — Reportstack, provider of premium market research reports announces the addition of The Saudi Arabian Defense Industry – Market Opportunities and Entry Strategies, Analyses and Forecasts to 2016 market report to its offering

The Saudi Arabian defense industry valued US$48 billion in 2011 and is one of the largest defense markets globally. During the review period, the country’s defense expenditure grew at a CAGR of 7.83%, and is expected to record a CAGR of 5.44 % over the forecast period, to value US$62.4 billion by 2016. The key drivers of such expenditure growth include increases in cross-border insurgency, domestic unease with the ruling regime, the rising number of Al Qaeda training camps in the country, an increasing focus on infrastructure security regarding oil and a regional rivalry with Iran to emerge as the most influential nation in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia’s substantial defense budget, coupled with the limited capabilities of domestic defense firms, is attracting foreign OEMs into the market.

The Police Reform Bahrain Needs
09 January, 2012 – Huffington Post – Joshua Colangelo-Bryan

John Timoney seems like a curious choice to advise security forces in the tiny but strategically important Middle Eastern country of Bahrain. An international commission has just criticized Bahrain’s security forces for excessive use of force and widespread arbitrary arrests in suppressing largely peaceful “Arab spring” demonstrations there.

Timoney, the former Miami and Philadelphia police chief, has won accolades for fighting crime and curbing police shootings of civilians. But his handling of street demonstrations protesting the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit in 2003 brought lawsuits by the American Civil Liberties Union over the same issues of excessive force and unlawful arrests.

Bahrain reportedly recruited Timoney to oversee police training. Without question, Bahraini security forces could benefit from professional training. But it’s not clear how one more Western cop can deliver meaningful reform through training when efforts by British and French police trainers have made no difference, to judge by what the world saw in Bahrain in February and March, and still can see today. Bahrain’s policing problems go much deeper than training, and if Timoney hopes to make a positive difference there, here’s what is really needed:

First, end the exclusion of Bahraini Shia, two-thirds of the population, from the security forces. The Sunni ruling family controls political power and a good chunk of the economy. Security posts are largely staffed by Sunnis with Shia excluded from all but menial jobs and unarmed “community police” positions. And many of the Interior Ministry’s front-line forces are recruited from Sunni communities in countries outside Bahrain. Many, in fact, are from places like the Baluchistan area of Pakistan, and don’t even speak Arabic.

The Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry called on Bahrain to “establish urgently, and implement vigorously, a programme for the integration into security forces of personnel from all the communities in Bahrain.” Chief Timoney should insist that this start now.
[Read more →]

Death squads are often, but not exclusively, associated with the violent political repression under dictatorships, totalitarian states and similar regimes. They typically have the tacit or express support of the state, as a whole or in part. Death squads may comprise a secret police force, paramilitary group or official government units with members drawn from the military or the police. They may also be organized as vigilante groups. They are a form of State Terrorism.

Several scholars have accused the United States of conducting state terrorism. They have written about the liberal democracies and their use of state terrorism, particularly in relation to the Cold War. According to them, state terrorism was used to protect the interest of capitalist elites, and the U.S. organized a neo-colonial system of client states, co-operating with local elites to rule through terror. However, little of this work has been recognized by other scholars of terrorism or even of state terrorism.

Works include Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman’s The political economy of human rights (1979), Herman’s The real terror network (1985), Alexander L. George’ Western state terrorism (1991), Frederick Gareau’s State terrorism and the United States (2004) and Doug Stokes’ America’s other war (2005).

Beginning in the late 1970s, Chomsky and Herman wrote a series of books on the United States and state terrorism. Their writings coincided with reports by Amnesty International and other human rights organizations of a new global “epidemic” of state torture and murder. Chomsky and Herman observed that terror was concentrated in the U.S. sphere of influence in the Third World, and documented terror carried out by U.S. client states in Latin America. They observed that of ten Latin American countries that had death squads, all were U.S. client states. Worldwide, 74% of countries that used torture on an administrative basis were U.S. client states, receiving military and other support to retain power. They concluded that the global rise in state terror was a result of U.S. foreign policy.

In 1991, a book edited by Alexander L. George also argued that other Western powers sponsored terror in Third World countries. It concluded that the U.S. and its allies were the main supporters of terrorism throughout the world. Gareau states that the number of deaths caused by non-state terrorism (3668 deaths between 1968 and 1980, as estimated by the CIA) is “dwarfed” by those resulting from state terrorism in U.S.-backed regimes such as Guatemala (150,000 killed, 50,000 missing in Guatemala – 93% of whom Gareau classifies as “victims of state terrorism”).

Chomsky concluded that all powers backed state terrorism in client states. At the top were the U.S. and other powers, notably the United Kingdom and France, that provided financial, military and diplomatic support to Third World regimes kept in power through violence. These governments acted together with multinational corporations, particularly in the arms and security industries. In addition, other Third World countries outside the Western sphere of influence carried out state terror supported by rival powers.
…source

Dr. Nada Dhaif (@NadaDhaif)
Posted Friday 13th January 2012 from Twitbird Pro
Todays collection of the traitors defection

Who is a traitor?

One who imprisons teachers and risks the future of the coming generations just to retain a seat or crush the educated elites, is a traitor!

One who defines patriotism as loyalty not to his country but to certain people, is a traitor!

One who demolishes mosques and destroys the country’s heritage out of enmity towards a certain sect, is a traitor!

One who attacks the medical profession, arrests docs and tortures patients in hospitals for the guilt of demanding their rights, is a traitor!

One who undermines the achievements of athletes,journalists and merchants; which count as the country’s own,targets & tortures them, is a traitor!

One who steps-on humanity and dignity; shuts his mind off to become a wild animal that feeds on people’s honors to please the masters, is a traitor!

One who distorts the country’s identity and brings in lowlifes who are willing to carry their shameful deeds for more money, is a traitor!

A traitor, is not only who By name betrays his own country but one who betrays the human laws that all God’s messengers and reformers brought along!

Finally,
To all traitors, thieves who stole homelands and dreams, criminals of humanity and money worshipers: Pack up your grave and to hell with it!

Bahrain: Rights Activist Attacked
13 January, 2012 – Human Rights Watch

The riot police’s assault on Nabeel Rajab and other peaceful demonstrators shows once again the government’s intolerance of peaceful assemblies. The authorities need to investigate this incident and hold those responsible for the attack to account. – Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch

(Beirut) – Bahraini riot police beat a prominent human rights activist, Nabeel Rajab, head of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, as he was leaving a peaceful protest on January 6, 2012, Human Rights Watch said today. The Bahraini authorities should immediately halt attacks on peaceful protesters, Human Rights Watch said.

The Interior Ministry said on its Twitter account that the police gave the protesters, who were calling for the release of detainees, a warning before dispersing them. Human Rights Watch talked to four participants in the demonstration who said that the riot police told them they would allow five minutes for the protesters to disperse on their own, but started firing sound bombs and teargas within one minute after the warning. While dispersing the demonstration the police assaulted at least three protesters in addition to Rajab.

“The riot police’s assault on Nabeel Rajab and other peaceful demonstrators shows once again the government’s intolerance of peaceful assemblies,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “The authorities need to investigate this incident and hold those responsible for the attack to account.”

Rajab, a member of the Human Rights Watch Middle East Advisory Committee, told Human Rights Watch that the police attacked him using their fists and batons at about 8:30 p.m., as he was walking toward his car:

I noticed a number of riot police behind me. They were all in uniform. They started beating me and I fell on the ground. I told them that I was Nabeel Rajab, hoping that they would stop, but they kept beating and kicking me…. Then an officer showed up and stopped them. I don’t exactly know how many riot police attacked me because they came from behind but I think there were three or four.

The Interior Ministry stated on its Twitter account that riot police had found Rajab “lying on the ground” and transported him to the Salmaniya Medical Complex for treatment.

Rajab spent several hours in the hospital. He said that he still has difficulty walking because of back pain and has filed a complaint about the incident.

On January 9 Bahrain’s High Court of Appeals continued the trial of 20 medical staff who had been convicted by the National Safety Lower Court, a special military court, on September 29, 2011, following the government crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in March 2011. The National Safety Lower Court found them guilty of charges that included forcibly taking over the Salmaniya Medical Complex and refusing treatment to patients based on sectarian affiliation. The court handed down sentences ranging from 5 years to 15 years in prison. On October 23, the Public Prosecution announced that in the appeals trial, they would not rely on the defendants’ confessions, many of which were allegedly extracted under torture, to prove their guilt.

However, at the January 9 session, the Public Prosecution declined to confirm before the court that it did not intend to introduce the doctors’ confessions into evidence, two of the defense lawyers, Jalila Said and Hameed al-Mulla, told Human Rights Watch. …source

Mohammed Al-Maskati, President of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, outlines the current human rights situation in Bahrain were the regime is killing and torturing the opposition. In the video he calls on concrete action by people of good will around the world.

Saudi security forces kill protester in oil province
By Martina Fuchs – by Rasid – 13 January, 2012

Saudi security forces killed a young protester and wounded three in the kingdom’s oil-producing Eastern Province, home to a large Shi’ite Muslim minority, websites and activists said on Friday.

Saudi Arabia, the world’s No. 1 oil exporter, is sensitive to any Shi’ite unrest in Eastern Province because of what it says are concerns it could be fomented by non-Arab Shi’ite power Iran to destabilise the Gulf region. Tehran denies involvement.

The Shi’ite website www.rasid.com said Saudi security forces opened heavy fire late on Thursday after protesters threw stones at a police vehicle in Awamiya, a village in Eastern Province.

It showed a file picture of 22-year-old Essam Mohamed Abu Abdallah and said he was killed by gunfire from security forces.

A Saudi Interior Ministry statement quoted by state news agency SPA said security forces patrolling Awamiya in their vehicle were attacked with petrol bombs and it caught fire.

“While the security forces were trying to control the fire, they were exposed to shooting and were dealing with the situation as necessary,” it said. “The exchange of fire led to two people being injured among those involved in the shooting, and they were taken to hospital where one of them died later.”

“The security forces will deal firmly with all cases and situations that endanger the security and safety of citizens and security forces,” the statement added.

The Rasid website also said security forces closed down the entrances to the village after clashes between villagers and security forces.

Saudi Arabia’s Shi’ite population is mostly based in two oasis districts of the Eastern Province – Qatif on the Gulf coast where Awamiya is located, and al-Ahsa southwest of the provincial capital al-Khobar.

The Sunni Muslim-ruled kingdom says it has 1.3 million Shi’ites in a total population of 19 million. Human rights groups say there are around 2 million Shi’ites in Saudi Arabia.

Earlier this month, Riyadh ordered the arrest of 23 Shi’ite Muslims in Eastern Province held responsible for unrest. Saudi Arabia accused the 23 of serving the agenda of a foreign power, usually a reference to Iran. …source