Bahrain Mirror: The United States State Department reiterated its concern by the deteriorating human rights situation in Bahrain, stressing that it does not want to see the island kingdom go back to where it was in 2011.

The State Department voiced its deep concern about the fact that prominent Bahraini human rights activist Nabeel Rajab has been detained on charges of spreading false news.

"We're going to continue to follow his case very closely. We believe that no one should be prosecuted or imprisoned for engaging in peaceful expression or assembly, even if it's controversial. We believe that societies are strengthened, not threatened, by peaceful expressions of opinion and dissent," stated US State Department Spokesperson John Kirby in a daily press briefing.

"We do continue to have concerns about the human rights situation in Bahrain. And we continue to raise our concerns with Bahrain publicly and privately about continuing limitations on peaceful assembly and political activism, the criminalization of free expression, and of course we talked to them about the importance of reconciliation. All of these things are documented, of course, in the Human Rights Report. But if you're asking me, do we continue to be concerned, yes we do. And obviously we are relaying those concerns directly to Bahraini officials," he stressed.

"Nobody wants to see it go back there. And I don't know that we're at a position now or a point where we can characterize the - we see the slide. Certainly, there's a worrisome trend here. But I just don't know that we're at a point where we think it's reaching that level," Kirby further noted.

When asked about a Bahraini court ruling sentencing eight people to 15 years in prison and stripping them of their citizenship under these allegations, Kirby explained that he wasn't aware of that particular case but reiterated that they're certainly seeing a worrisome trend in Bahrain, and they'll continue to express their concerns to the kingdom about this. 

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