Bahrain – Democracy Exiled and in Chains

Bahrain’s Activists Survive Off the Island
By: Marc Abizeid – Al Akhbar – 18 December, 2013

On-the-ground sources are running out fast in Bahrain. Those who have not been locked up or tortured for opposing the ruling monarchy are finding themselves with no option but exile.

Thirty-one-year-old Yousif al-Muhafda is the latest activist to join the growing list of asylum seekers to flee Bahrain – ruled by the Khalifa family since their 1783 invasion of the Gulf archipelago brought the tribesmen to power.

Two weeks ago Muhafda wrote a letter from Europe announcing he would not be returning home after receiving a barrage of death threats, following the launch of a campaign that publicly outed officials involved in the torture and killing of prisoners.

“The son of the king can go on TV and threaten protesters, and officials can send death threats under their real names and photos, and they feel confident that they won’t be held to account.”
The most alarming threat came from Adel Fleifel – a former security official notorious for corruption and torture – who, in thinly veiled terms, called for the father of two to be killed in a tweet earlier this month.

“This is what we mean when we talk about the culture of impunity in Bahrain,” Muhafda told Al-Akhbar.

“The son of the king can go on TV and threaten protesters, and officials can send death threats under their real names and photos, and they feel confident that they won’t be held to account.”

Documenting crimes

With short curly hair and long, neatly trimmed sideburns that curve down past his earlobes, Muhafda looks more like an aspiring pop star than a local champion for human rights, now widely recognizable across Bahrain.

Muhafda was the eyes and ears of the popular revolt which broke out on February 14, 2011 to demand political reforms and an end to the Khalifa dynasty’s concentration of wealth and power.

As head of the documentation unit at the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR), he closely monitored the ensuing (and ongoing) regime crackdown on dissidents which has left about 90 civilians dead in an island kingdom of 1.2 million, half of whom are migrant workers and other foreigners.

Unable to contain the movement, Bahrain’s regime ushered in a Saudi-led Gulf force a month after the uprising began in a bid to crush it. The move was quietly supported by the United States which continued to send arms to Bahrain, home to the US Fifth Fleet.

For almost three years Muhafda traversed from village to village, interviewing people who had been harassed, beaten, shot, and had their homes raided and ransacked by regime forces. With mounting evidence in hand, he shared an endless stream of photographs, videos, and reports implicating the kingdom’s ruling family in violations of human rights to his nearly 100,000 followers on Twitter.

Since the 2011 revolt he has been arrested seven times, and collectively spent about eight weeks in prison for documenting violations. …more