Bahrain Mirror: Abdullah Janahi, leader in the dissolved Wa'ad society, said the measures of security check up on candidates of the boards of civil society in Bahrain represents the "McCarthyism of revenge in Bahrain", adding that "we turned from a civil state into a security state."

"Since the beginning, the 14 February popular movement suddenly changed from a movement of just demands- remember the statement of his highness the crown prince at that time- to being described as a terrorist act and those supporting it were deemed criminals and terrorists," Janahi added on his Twitter account.

"Then came the National Safety stage which put an end to any practice related to the Constitution and Human Rights Bill which our government has ratified. Blood was shed and human rights were violated. Bassiouni (royal investigation committee) then came with his report that was aborted. After that, the national dialogue started along with other episodes of the play you all know," he said.

Janahi hoped "reform would be achieved after the acknowledgment of Bassiouni report. However, revenge started instead. All the authorities were mobilized. Besides, all effective opposition societies like Wa'ad, Al-Wefaq and others were turned into illegal societies and were dissolved afterwards. Their members were also denied candidacy."

"Changing the laws of civil society continued, some of which were changed in administrative decisions, with the aim of preventing members of dissolved societies from running for civil society councils and clubs, and it is possible that they will be prevented later on from joining the councils and speaking in public and even private seminars. This is what actually happened with Ibrahim Sharif, Ali Saleh who were prevented from giving lectures," he continued.

"Let us now quietly discuss the difference between the security mind and the sound human mind; the first is only concerned with private security, which is very far from the effects of its decisions on human, economic and human rights development. The rights (according to the security mind) are not important and so is the case with the agreements the government ratified. Human beings, their dreams and rights are of no concern to it. Only security is."

"However, the (healthy human) mind which cares about human and economic development, believes that security is important as a necessity for stability, and human beings are of different ideas and they have the right to disagree and oppose, and if dissidents are suppressed by laws, this development will be weakened because society needs diversity to develop. The dominance of one opinion is death."

Janahi concluded by saying that "a ruling was issued dissolving Wa'ad and Al-Wefaq, which is a ruling (concerning societies) as a legal body and not issued against the persons (belonging to) these societies, as some of them may have been against decisions taken by their societies, as the decision-making mechanism in these societies is taken by majority, so why are the members to blame? Why are they prevented from holding seminars or running for civil societies?"

Arabic Version