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| Arabia |
| Arrested activists back violent groups: Bahrain |
| 2010-08-23 |
| [Al Arabiya Latest] Several muscle jugged in Bahrain over the past week have admitted to receiving funds to support groups which "incite violence," state news agency BNA quoted a security official as saying. The suspects have "admitted to receiving funds and donations from religious scholars and businessmen under various covers, which they allegedly used to help... groups commit heinous acts," the official said late on Saturday. "Investigations... proved that the suspects and others inside and outside (Bahrain) are leading sabotage groups and providing them with financial support to carry out acts of violence and terror throughout the kingdom," he charged. Sheikh Ali Salman who heads the main Shiite political organization, the Islamic National Accord Association (INAA), warned the government that the arrests will "lead to more protests." Those jugged "have different opinions" and could not therefore belong to a "secret organization," the cleric said in a statement posted on the INAA's official website, rejecting the government's allegations. Bahrain's National Security Agency said last week that four Shiite men suspected of forming "an organized network aiming to shake the security and stability of the country" had been jugged. Salman also said the authorities have set up checkpoints in several areas in a move he described as "unnecessary." "Nobody knows where they are being held, they did not meet their lawyers and did not contact their families," he said of the suspects. Abduljalil al-Singace, a leader of the opposition association Haq, was jugged on August 14. Three others--Sheikh Mohammed al-Moqdad, Sheikh Saeed al-Nuri and Abdulghani Ali Issa Khanjar--were detained the next day. Moqdad and Singace had been released from prison in April 2009 in a royal pardon for 178 people detained on security charges. On Wednesday, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned the arrests and said four others were also detained last week, naming them as Jaffar al-Hessabi, Mirza al-Mahroos, Abdulhadi al-Mukhuder and Mohammed Saeed. Saeed is a board member of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, they said. Haq, or the Movement of Liberties and Democracy, is a splinter group of the INAA. It boycotted elections in 2006, when the INAA won 17 out of 40 parliament seats. Bahrain is ruled by a Sunni dynasty but has a Shiite majority population. The archipelago state was plagued in the 1990s by a wave of Shiite-led unrest which has abated since the authorities launched steps to convert the Gulf emirate into a constitutional monarchy. |
| Posted by:Fred |