Unadulterated Hypocrisy: ‘UK forces oversee Bahrain repression’

Unadulterated Hypocrisy: ‘UK forces oversee Bahrain repression’
11 September, 2012 – Hardons Blog

British and American military and security advisors are overseeing training to Bahraini forces involved in the crackdown on revolutionaries, a leader of Bahrain’s Amal Movement says.

Hisham al-Sabbagh told Al-Alam news network that the al-Khalifa regime in Bahrain is also receiving military hardware including tanks from a number of western countries and some members of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council.

Al-Sabbagh’s comments come only weeks after Bahraini ruler Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and British Prime Minister David Cameron pledged to step up cooperation during Hamad’s visit to London in late August.

Hamad did point to security cooperation between the two sides after the meeting but disguised it as an attempt to “improve security and combat the spread of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.”

Cameron and Hamad also ironically called for cooperation to boost human rights and democracy while Bahraini forces continue to crush anti-regime protests.

The British government has been repeatedly blasted by human rights, anti-war and anti-arms trade activists for arming repressive regimes including Bahrain despite clear evidence of bloody suppression of pro-democracy demonstrations there.

Over the past months the British MPs have also joined the critics.

The MPs said in their 2012 Scrutiny of Arms Exports that the government’s arms exports decisions have been clearly flawed as known repressive regimes such as Bahrain were armed regardless.

The MPs also said the government paradoxically considers some of the countries on its own list of human right abusers as “priority markets” for arms sales. …source