Bahrain Mirror: Bahrain's Fourth High Criminal Court, presided over by judge Ali Al-Dhahrani with the membership of judges Hamad bin Salman Al Khalifa and Jamal Awad and Ahmad Al-Sulaiman as secretariat, convicted 13 accused over charges of assembly and hurling Molotov cocktail against a security patrol and damaging it.

The court sentenced the suspects, the first to the fourth and from the sixth to the thirteenth to 10 years in prison while it sentenced the seventh suspect to 3 years with a fine of 500 BD over acquiring ammunitions used in shotgun arms. The court also handed down a 3-year jail term to the fifth suspect since he is a minor and ordered the confiscation of seized items.

The authorities claimed that on August 10, 2014 and September 4, 2014, the suspects deliberately set a police patrol on fire in the capital's security department and participated with other unknown citizens in an assembly of more than 5 people, aiming at breaching security and putting people's lives and properties in danger and acquiring flammable explosives.

The prosecution claimed that the seventh suspect acquired ammunitions used in shotgun arms for a terrorist aim.

Human rights organizations challenge the charges raised against the suspects since they doubt the independence of the judiciary, whose members are assigned by royal decrees, and since it issues sentences based on confessions extracted under duress and evidence presented by secret investigations and anonymous witnesses.

Arabic Issue