Bahrain Mirror (Exclusive): Bahrain Center for Human Rights said that the authorities released 260 political prisoners within the royal decree that pardoned1490 prisoners "for humanitarian reasons amid the current circumstances".

This means that the political prisoners accounted for 17% of the released. This percentage is a disappointment to thousands of families who waited to see their sons released. However, the authorities are very preserved in the releases.

"From 2011 to 2020, 33 special pardons were issued for 5,156 people," legal counsel Ibrahim Sarhan says. He explained that "the lowest percentage (of these decrees) was made for political cases and cases related to freedom of opinion and expression, at 7.4%."

"The seriousness of the global situation and its great efforts to counter the Coronavirus require wider and faster actions in Bahrain, including the release of prisoners," Sarhan says. "The number of prisoners (political and criminal) is still more than 4,500, while prisons can embrace only 2,145 prisoners."

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