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, sentenced the first to the sixth suspects to 10 years in prison over joining assembly and assaulting police in Saar and sentenced 4 others to 5 years in prison. The court; however, acquitted some of the suspects of the charges brought against them.

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