Canadian fugitive in Bahrain hiding from torturers for participating in Protest

‘I saw death’: Canadian in Bahrain says he’s hiding to escape his torturers
By Thandi Fletcher – 26 January, 2012 – Vancouver Sun

Terrified that he will be beaten to death if he is dragged back to prison, a Kuwait-born Canadian citizen says he has gone into hiding in Bahrain after losing his appeal of his conviction for breaking the country’s illegal assembly laws.

Naser Al-Raas told Postmedia News on Thursday that he is afraid he will be arrested If he shows his face in public.

“My greatest fear is being tortured again,” he said. “I experienced it once before and it was like hell. This is my fear.”

On Tuesday, Al-Raas lost his appeal against a previous conviction on charges related to participating in pro-democracy protests.

Bahrain’s Third Superior Court upheld Al-Raas’ five-year prison sentence.

A former Ottawa resident, Al-Raas was sentenced in late October last year along with 12 others for having links to the demonstrations.

Of the 13 convicted on charges of illegal assembly, rioting and incitement, Al-Raas said he was the only one not acquitted on Tuesday.

Believing his phone line is likely tapped, Al-Raas spoke with Postmedia News from an undisclosed location via Skype.

During the interview, gunfire could be heard in the distance.

“(The police) are attacking every village, every place to oppress the protesters,” said Al-Raas, occasionally coughing — something he blamed on tear gas fumes wafting into his hiding place from the street.

“When I smell it, I feel some kind of, like I want to vomit. I’m sick,” he said. “(The tear gas) makes a big cloud which covers the whole village.”

But Al-Raas said the sting of the gas was nothing compared to what he has endured over the past year in Bahrain.

His ordeal began when he was visiting his five sisters there last March, he said. Al-Raas was working as an IT specialist in Kuwait at the time.
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