Commenting on the sentences issued against 6 defendants over planning an attempted assault against the commander-in-chief of the Bahrain Defense Force (BDF), the Bahrain Forum for Human Rights (BFHR) said in a statement that the sentences came after extracting confessions under torture and seriously violating the standards of fair trials. The BFHR considered it to be a black day in the history of justice in Bahrain, stressing that this warns that the military judiciary is unrestrainedly prosecuting civilians on charges of freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, especially since the amendment to the Military Judiciary Law authorizes the death penalty in 31 articles and paragraphs.

The BFHR added that the victims in this trial were subjected to 11 violations, including torture with electric shock, solitary confinement and enforced disappearance. The BFHR further said that communications engineer Sayed Alawi Hussein, who is the personal escort of Ayatollah Sheikh Isa Qassim, and Sayed Fadhel Abbas were forcibly disappeared for nearly a year, while Mohammed Al-Shehabi and human rights activist Mohammed Al-Motaghawi were forcibly disappeared for months. The BFHR added that some of the lawyers and the families of the defendants were threatened to be subjected to degrading treatment if they revealed the violations to the media or international human rights organizations, noting that the military judiciary hid the report of the forensic doctor which proves that Sayed Alawi Hussein Alawi was tortured.

The BFHR said that human rights activist and head of Liberties and Human Rights Department at Al-Wefaq National Islamic Society, Mohammed Al-Motaghawi, was arrested on May 23, 2017 when excessive force was used to break up the peaceful gathering in Al-Duraz area. The BFHR added that he was tortured while he was arbitrarily detained for hours in front of the house of Ayatollah Sheikh Isa Qassim, the highest religious authority for Shiites in Bahrain. The BFHR pointed out that one of the defendants told his family that he had no choice other than confessing because he would face death due to torture with electric shocks if he did not confess.

The BFHR explained that the plaintiff in this case, the commander-in-chief of the Bahrain Defense Force, oversees the appointment of military judges and the distribution of positions. Therefore, the lawyers demanded that the case be transferred to the civil judiciary because such case is not in the jurisdiction of the military judiciary, but the judge refused. The BFHR pointed out that the report of the Independent Commission of Inquiry condemned the sentences handed down in 2011 to civilians by the military judiciary, explaining that some of the defendants were tortured before a judge in the court in 2011 and no legal liability was inflicted upon the perpetrators.

The BFHR added that at the second hearing, on October 30, 2017, the defendants were surprised by the charge of planning an assassination brought against them, since they were not interrogated based upon them, in addition, the court refused the request of the lawyers to receive a copy of the case file. The BFHR also said that some defendants were not allowed to meet with their lawyers except when they met them for the first time at the third hearing on November 2, 2017 for five minutes, pointing out that one of the victims, who were arrested while they were still children, asked his father in the courtroom who the commander-in-chief of the BDF is, since he had heard that he was the plaintiff and he does not even know his name!

The BFHR further said that three of the defendants were arrested while they were still children, and they are Montather Fawzi Abdul Karim Al-Durazi, Mohammed Abdul Wahed Mohammed and Hussein Isam Hussein Abdullah.

In its statement, the BFHR called upon the member states of the Human Rights Council and the High Commissioner for Human Rights to quickly and urgently interfere to stop the

implementation of the death sentence and to open an independent investigation by a certain UN committee to investigate all complaints of violations in this case, including complaints of torture and ill-treatment.

The military court issued its verdicts today against 18 defendants, condemning 6 of them and sentencing them to death, and to 15 years in prison, and stripping them of their Bahraini nationality. Seven defendants were sentenced to seven years in prison and stripping them of their Bahraini nationality, whereas five defendants were acquitted.