State of emergency to end in Bahrain as activists go on trial

Bahrain state TV said the state of emergency will end June 1 in line with a royal decree. The lifting of the martial laws – two weeks before the three-month emergency rule’s official expiry – seemed to reflect the rulers’ determination to again showcase the kingdom as stable and able to host international events like the Formula One race.

Since martial law was imposed March 15, authorities have been aggressively pursuing Shiite opposition supporters who staged weeks of street marches earlier this year, demanding greater freedoms, equal rights and an elected government in the strategic island kingdom, home to the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet.

Hundreds of protesters, activists, political leaders and Shiite professionals such as doctors and lawyers have been detained.

Late last month, the security court sentenced four protesters to death for killing two policemen in the unrest. Three other opposition supporters were convicted as accomplices in the murders and were sentenced to life in prison.

The 21 opposition leaders and political activists who went on trial Sunday in a special security court set up under the emergency rule face charges of attempting to overthrow the Sunni monarchy.

Fourteen members of the group are in custody. The others were charged in absentia. During today’s closed-door court proceedings, the 21 defendants pleaded not guilty. Another hearing was set for Thursday.

The allegations include seeking to topple the 200-year-old Sunni monarchy and having links to “a terrorist organisation abroad working for a foreign country.” No additional details were made public, but Bahrain’s leaders have claimed that Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Shiite militant group Hezbollah is involved in Bahrain’s protests.

Bahrain also is locked in a deepening quarrel with Iran, which has sharply criticised the wave of arrests and the dispatch of a 1,500-strong Saudi-led force in March to prop up the monarchy.

At least 30 people have been killed since members of Bahrain’s Shiite majority took their grievances to the streets in February. The protests were inspired by revolts against autocratic leaders in Tunisia and Egypt.

Meanwhile, gunfire and shelling rattled the city of Homs in central Syria yesterday, killing a 12-year-old boy, as President Bashar Assad’s autocratic regime expanded its military crackdown on a seven-week-old uprising, activists reported.