Human Rights First Seeks Sanctions for Torture in Bahrain Prisons
Washington D.C. — Human Rights First today submitted a dossier to the U.S. government recommending targeted sanctions against Sheikh Rashid bin Abdullah al Khalifa, Bahrain’s long-serving interior minister, based on his role in torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment in prisons he oversees.
As a state that has ratified the Convention Against Torture, Bahrain was subject to periodic review this year by the UN’s Committee Against Torture. Bahraini officials insisted at the review that “human rights and criminal justice were respected in Bahrain.” But in its final observations released in late November, the Committee stated that it remained “concerned about consistent reports indicating that persons in custody are subjected to torture or ill-treatment,” and “deeply concerned at the reported lack of accountability, which contributes to a climate of impunity.”
“Torture and cruel treatment in Bahrain’s prisons have continued well past the crackdown on the country’s 2011 uprising,” said Uzra Zeya, President and CEO of Human Rights First. “U.S. law requires that government officials involved in gross violations of human rights like these be barred from entering the country. More importantly, signaling that the U.S. government takes these abuses seriously would be an important step in pressing Bahraini authorities to protect human rights defenders and other prisoners, and to finally end their arbitrary detentions.”
Since 2011, there have been numerous reports of torture and other cruel treatment against detainees, many of whom are political prisoners, inside prisons and other facilities operated by Bahrain’s Ministry of Interior. Prisoners have been denied essential health care, sometimes leading to their deaths, and faced beatings to elicit confessions. The U.S. State Department has repeatedly acknowledged such abuses. Leaders like Sheikh Rashid, who has been head of the interior ministry since 2004, have not taken meaningful measures to end the abuses happening on their watch or hold perpetrators accountable.
Senior members of Congress – including Marco Rubio, when he was a senator – have rightly sounded the alarm that Bahrain’s record of abuses puts the U.S.-Bahrain relationship on an unstable foundation.
In a 2021 letter led by Rubio and Sen. Ron Wyden, for example, senators noted they were “deeply concerned about the impact this violent repression has on Bahrain’s citizens and on the country’s longer-term stability,” and “particularly concerned that the government of Bahrain’s violent, systemic repression will breed resentment and instability, and could ultimately threaten the long-term presence of the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet….” The senators also asked if the State Department had “considered Global Magnitsky Act authority or other sanctions authorities against members of the government of Bahrain responsible for serious human rights violations.”
Human Rights First’s action today follows in that vein, providing evidence to U.S. agencies that Minister Rashid’s actions make him eligible for financial sanctions under the Global Magnitsky program and trigger a mandatory visa ban under the Section 7031(c) program. Rather than embracing a false stability in Bahrain built on impunity, U.S. action is urgently needed to change behavior and spur accountability.
Human Rights First has been documenting human rights violations in Bahrain since 2011, although it has not been allowed into the country since 2012. In 2014, Congressman Jim McGovern was denied entry to the kingdom with Human Rights First Senior Advisor Brian Dooley. Dooley was also refused entry at Bahrain’s airport in 2018. Human Rights First has been a leading voice on torture and other human rights issues in Bahrain, briefing and testifying in the U.S. Congress, at the Italian Parliament, and the UN. Human Rights First called for a U.S. visa ban on Bahrain’s Prince Nasser bin Hamad al Khalifa in 2024 based on his alleged involvement in torture.
