BFHR’s symposium: Supporting prisoners of conscience is a human and moral duty The Bahrain Forum for Human Rights organised - on Tuesday evening, February 7, 2023 - a virtual symposium, via Instagram, entitled "Bahrain’s Prisoners of Conscience: Relentless Repression". Activist Ahmed Al-Mutghawi, the moderator of the symposium, confirmed that state watchdogs ignore the abuses taking place in prisons, calling for the support of prisoners of conscience with all possible peaceful means of pressure. In turn, rights advocate, Mohammed Sultan, pointed out that sustainable development -which the Bahraini government claims to seek- can not be achieved when prisons are overcrowded with prisoners of conscience. Sultan stressed that their release is a necessary step, calling for not betting on breaking the will of the Bahraini people through arbitrary arrests, because this steadfast people is becoming further steadfast in demanding their rights and demands. For his part, political activist, Jaafar Yahya, assured that what the prisoners are exposed to for demanding respect and guarantee of intuitive rights and freedoms is a systematic transgression that cannot be tolerated without the political prisoners’ exceptional patience. Yahya held the Bahraini Parliament responsible for following up and establishing committees to investigate the abuses, which the detainees revealed in their recent audio recordings released from behind bars. He also held the international community responsible for providing justice to those "innocent" detainees. Besides, activist and father of political detainee, Mr. Ali Muhanna, noted that what the political prisoners revealed -through the audios- is part of the incredible ill-treatment that cannot be tolerated; a risk that will expose them to retaliation, but it is an attempt to raise their voice and stop the suffering. He emphasized that, since 2011, parliamentarians have been ignoring their duty towards these people and their fundamental rights. Muhanna revealed that he tried to communicate with several deputies, but they apologised because they were afraid to even expose this grievance in light of the complicity and shameful silence of other government bodies. Chairman of BFHR & Human rights activist, Baqer Darwish, affirmed that the current collective strike of detainees and their advanced human rights discourse is positive, and it must be embraced to put pressure on the Jau prison administration. Darwish commented on one of the interlocutors, who accused prisoners of conscience of being "terrorists", that this discourse expresses the same security mentality pursued by the prison administration. |