According to the Gulf Center for Human Rights, Nabeel Rajab was severely beaten by Bahraini security forces earlier today, January 6, after participating in a peaceful protest in Manama, the country’s capital. Rajab told his lawyer that he was beaten all over his body and has suffered serious facial injuries as a result. He was taken to Salmanyia hospital and was refused the right to consult with his lawyer or see human rights activists from the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights. Rajab’s son, Adam, was allowed to see him, though security officers confiscated his phone after he tried to take pictures of his father’s injuries. Rajab has since been released from the hospital.  

 

This attack comes less than one month after the World Movement issued a DemocracyAlert on the Bahrain government’s attempts to threaten and intimidate Rajab after he appeared on television to discuss the 2011 Ion Ratiu Democracy Award, which he received earlier this year from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. 

 

Rajab is president of the Gulf Center for Human Rights and the Bahrain Center for Human Rights. 

 

The World Movement for Democracy expresses its solidarity with Nabeel Rajab and his family and calls on the Bahraini government to

cease harassing peaceful protestors.