Bahrain Mirror: The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and other international and Bahraini nongovernmental organizations strongly condemned the repeated use of the death penalty by Bahraini authorities and called on the government to commute the death and life sentences.

In a statement published on the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) website, the organizations highlighted a number of violations in Bahrain, one of which is sentencing a Bahraini man to death and 22 others to life imprisonment in December 31, 2015; bringing the total number of persons on death row in the country to 10 convicts. On the same day, death row inmate Salman Isa's first appeal was rejected and 12 out of the 23 suspects were sentenced in absentia.

"Bahrain has seen a rise in the use of the death penalty and denaturalization in 2015. Bahraini courts passed seven new death sentences, and the Court of Appeals rejected the case of Mohammad Ramadan and Hussein Moussa who are sentenced to death," they added.

"Ramadan and Moussa are among the first people to have exhausted all legal avenues of appeal, and stand at risk of imminent execution", the organizations pointed out, further stating that "human rights activists based in Bahrain fear that this risk has heightened following Saudi Arabia's execution of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr and 46 others, which inflamed tensions last week."

They declared as well that all the defendants were stripped of their citizenships bringing the total number of those whose nationalities were revoked to 200 persons during 2015.

"The documented unfair trials, use of torture and death sentences Bahrain has carried out may be in breach of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which Bahrain acceded to in 2006."

The organizations also condemned the unfair trials those sentenced to death are facing, as well as the use of torture, calling on the Bahraini government to "commute all death sentences; establish a moratorium on the death penalty with a view to abolition; investigate and prosecute all acts of torture, mistreatment, enforced disappearance; and establish procedures to ensure the fairness of all criminal trials and appeals."

The co-signatories organizations are: Action by Christians for the Abolition of Torture (ACAT France), Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain (ADHRB), Bahrain Centre for Human Rights (BCHR), Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (BIRD), FIDH (International Federation for Human Rights), Redress and Reprieve.

Arabic Issue