Findings from Dublin Medical Mission to Bahrain

Bahrain/Dublin: Professor Eoin O’Brien writes in todays Irish Examiner on the findings of the recent humanitarian mission to Bahrain
Posted on 2011/08/02 – Front Line Protection for Human Rights Defenders

Professor Eoin O’Brien writes in todays Irish Examiner on the findings of the recent humanitarian mission to Bahrain to offer support to imprisoned Bahraini doctors and their families.Three of the imprisoned doctors, Dr Ali Al Ekri, Dr Basim Daif and Dr Ghassan Daif studied in the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin.

The delegation was led by Professor Damian McCormac, who was also joined by Ms Averil Power TD (member of the Irish Parliament). Ms Marion Harken MEP, Mr David Andrews former Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs and Front Line representatives Andrew Anderson and Khalid Ibrahim. The full text of the article is published below.

“I went home from my work as usual following a day of work as an oncologist at the Salymaniya Medical Centre. I was awoken from sleep at 3 a.m. when the door of my apartment was kicked open and I was pulled form my bed by two men who then ransacked the flat, shook and searched my four-year old child, packed my personal papers and computer, and then dragged me from my flat to an a van surrounded by police cars. I protested that my child was alone and young and was told she would be looked after.

I was taken to a room blindfolded and handcuffed with my hands behind my back. After hours of standing against a wall I was verbally insulted and then placed in solitary confinement for 10 days in a small dirty cell, during which time I was tortured, sexually molested by both male and female interrogators and beaten with a hose on the back and neck. I was then moved to a gaol where I could hear other prisoners being tortured and I was interrogated repeatedly. I was filmed signing many papers the content of which no longer mattered to me, but among which was a confession that I had stolen drugs from the Hospital and that I had incited disturbance.

This harrowing account is typical of many similar reports from imprisoned doctors who have been released form prison, and from the spouses and children of doctors who remain in prison that I have heard first-hand during a recent visit to Bahrain as a member of delegation consisting two doctors, Damian McCormack and me; three politicians, Averil Power, Senator of the Irish Parliament, David Andrews, former Minister for Foreign Affairs for Ireland, and Marian Harkin, Member of the European Parliament; two members of Dublin based international human rights organisation Front Line Defenders, the Deputy Director, Andrew Anderson, and Khalid Ibrahim; and a freelance photo journalist, Conor McCabe.

During a two-day visit we met close to 100 people from all sides of Bahraini life. We were brought to the house of a family, which had suffered dearly in the aftermath of the protests, where 27 women and men were gathered representing doctors who had been released from prison to await trial, and the spouses and children of doctors detained in prison. We were brought to a secret suburban location at night to meet ambulance drivers who had been taken from their ambulances, imprisoned and tortured, and medical students, some of whom have been prevented continuing their studies.

At our meeting with the doctors and their relatives their fairness in acknowledging what had been good in the Bahrain health care system, their affection for Salmaniya Hospital where so many of them had served for many years, and their regard for the previous Minister of Health, who had resigned because he had failed to protect doctors, was in contrast to their sense of betrayal by RCSI-Bahrain and the fact that none from the many representatives of both RCSI or RCPI, who had visited the country recently for the conferring of doctors, had made any attempt to contact the families of imprisoned health care workers. …more