Stop the Sale of US Arms to Bahrain

  • by: Anonymous
  • recipient: U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives

The Bahraini military is detaining, trying, and allegedly even torturing civilian prisoners – and Trump just decided to sell them nearly $1 billion worth of new weapons.

Last Christmas, the Bahraini military convicted 12 civilians and a soldier in an illegal mass trial marred by evidence of enforced disappearances, torture, and other due process violations. Six of the men were sentenced to death.

While the king reduced the death sentences to life imprisonment, the men, in the words of seven UN human rights experts, "should have never been convicted on the basis of flawed trials" in the first place. Now the detainees are languishing in a military prison, where they're at risk of continued torture and abuse.

Seven years after they were used to help crush the 2011 Arab Spring protests, military trials for civilians are the new normal for repression in Bahrain. In April 2017, the king signed a constitutional amendment to expand the military's jurisdiction to "national security" cases even in peacetime – a clear violation of international law. Worse still, Bahraini legislation purposefully defines "national security" and "terror" offenses to encompass all forms of criticism and dissent against the government, virtually criminalizing human rights activism and independent journalism.

The UN condemned the trials, and even Trump's own State Department criticized the new military court amendment in its human rights report last month.

But now the Trump Administration is rewarding the perpetrators of these abuses with brand new missiles and helicopter gunships.

We, the undersigned are outraged that the US has decided to resume the sale of arms to Bahrain, a state which represses its people and is responsible for human rights violations.

More American weapons will only empower Bahrain to crack down harder on human rights defenders, political activists, and anyone seeking freedom and democracy. If Trump gets his way, we'll be complicit.

This sale represents support for the government of Bahrain and therefore gives legitimacy to the brutal and unjust treatment of many Bahraini people. In doing this you are allowing the human rights abuses to continue. The marginalization of the majority Shia Muslim population, torturing and mistreating political prisoners to extract confessions, blocked websites and blogs associated with the legal opposition, and harassment of human rights defenders must not be allowed to continue. Therefore, we ask you to stop the sale of arms to this nation and your support for this government.

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