Where in the World is Zainab al-Khawaja?

Interview with Wafi Kamel Al-Majed, husband of imprisoned human rights activist, Zainab al-Khawaja
by Witness Bahrain – 1 May, 2012

In the hall of Wafi’s father’s house, where Wafi is staying with his 2-year-old daughter Jude, there were two big photos decorating the wall, one of Zainab, and one of Wafi on their graduation day. They both wore huge smiles, looking like any other new, young graduates with bright and promising futures ahead of them…

I asked Wafi about his wife’s current condition and the visit he had to the prison where Zainab is being held. It was just the day before, on Sunday 29 April at 12:30, that he had been allowed his first visit since Zainab’s arrest a week before. He and little Jude, two of Zainab’s sisters, and Zainab’s mother, Khadija, had gone together. A prison guard brought Zainab into the little visiting room and stayed in the room for the duration of the half-hour visit. Zainab told her family how she had been beaten by the police during her arrest. Riot police surrounded her as she kneeled on the ground, and proceeded to kick her with their boots and jab her with their police batons. Although the police filmed her arrest, the camera focused on her face and upper body, while police aimed their attacks at her lower body. Other protesters had also told Wafi that the police filmed the arrest, but not from the ground when Zainab was being abused. Zainab shouted at them, “why are you treating us like dogs” to which a police woman responded by putting her baton to Zainab’s neck and choking her. …more