Impunity for Crimes Committed Against Journalists in Bahrain: An Official Policy

On April 12, 2011, the family of Abdulkarim Fakhrawi (49), a publisher and one of the founders of Bahrain’s Al-Wasat newspaper, received his body after he had been held in detention, only to discover that he had died as a result of severe torture. The Bahraini Ministry of Interior, however, announced at the time that he had died of kidney failure.

The following year, after the publication of the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry report, only two police officers were put on trial on charges of assault resulting in unintentional death, rather than torture resulting in death. At the end of that year, they were sentenced to just seven years in prison, a sentence that was subsequently reduced to three years by the Court of Appeal. Fakhrawi’s family did not receive the justice they had awaited, given the brutality of what had happened. His wife wrote on her account on X: “The divine court is more powerful than their court. The divine court is the just court that brings solace to our hearts… Damn a regime that does not know right from wrong.”

On April 9, 2011, Zakariya Rashid Hassan Al-Ashiri was killed under torture in prison, seven days after his arrest on charges of “inciting hatred,” “spreading false news,” and “calling for the overthrow of the regime on online forums,” after having operated an online discussion forum. Subsequently, three police officers were acquitted following a trial that lasted a year. The trial ended in acquittal, continuing the pattern of impunity in general, and particularly in cases involving journalists and bloggers.

But Zakariya Al-Ashiri is not the only person working in journalism who, or whose family, has been denied justice. The killer of photographer Ahmed Ismail (22) remains at large. Ismail was killed near a main road, where six surveillance cameras belonging to commercial establishments were located along the same street. The Ministry of Interior seized the recordings following the incident, but no charges were brought against anyone.

The Bahraini authorities have not pursued a policy of impunity solely in cases involving the killing of journalists and publishers. The same policy has extended to cases of torture suffered by male and female journalists inside Bahraini prisons. Journalist Faisal Hayat was subjected to physical, psychological, and sexual torture during his 84-day detention. He was subsequently released without any of those responsible for his torture being brought to trial.

When the Bahraini authorities brought a single female police officer to trial in the case involving the torture of journalist Nazeeha Saeed, following a major scandal over the torture of a journalist working as a correspondent for Agence France-Presse, the officer was acquitted at all three levels of judicial proceedings: the High Criminal Court, the Court of Appeal, and the Court of Cassation. There has been no justice for Nazeeha, despite three medical reports confirming that she had been tortured: one issued by Bahrain’s forensic medicine authorities under the Ministry of Interior, another by Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), and a third by a French hospital.

Saeed accused several policewomen and officers at Riffa Police Station of participating in her torture and humiliation. However, the Public Prosecution charged only one of them, a recently recruited officer who was no older than 25. She was subsequently acquitted.

In addition to Hayat and Saeed, numerous journalists and photographers have been subjected to torture, detention, and even enforced disappearance. They include Ali Jawad, Ahmed Humaidan, Mohammed Al-Sheikh, Haider Mohammed, Mazen Mahdi, Sayed Ahmed Al-Mousawi, Mohammed Al-Mukharaq, and Hussein Hubail, as well as blogger Abduljalil Al-Singace, who remains sentenced to life imprisonment.

The government authorities refrain from implementing the principle of accountability and avoid punishing those responsible for unlawful practices targeting journalists, including harassment, detention, and torture. This approach reinforces the belief that these violations enjoy official protection and form part of systematic policies aimed at obstructing fact-finding efforts, undermining press freedom, and punishing anyone who seeks to expose violations or draw attention to them.

On the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists, the Bahraini authorities show no indication of intending to end these policies, which have continued since 2011 and witnessed a dangerous escalation with the outbreak of war in the Gulf earlier this year. The authorities launched a campaign of arrests targeting more than 300 people across the country for expressing their opinions, participating in peaceful protests, or publishing photographs and video footage related to the war, in a continuation of the policy of restricting public freedoms and criminalizing peaceful expression.

The authorities also arrested prominent photojournalist Sayed Baqer Al-Kamel, who was sentenced to ten years in prison for publishing a video documenting the aftermath of an Iranian attack on Bahrain during the war. Al-Kamel was convicted on several charges, including publishing content deemed supportive of Iran, filming and publishing footage of sensitive infrastructure, and unlawfully disseminating material relating to defence affairs.

The Bahraini authorities make considerable efforts to promote the Kingdom internationally as an open country and a haven of freedom and tolerance, at a time when, since the closure of Al-Wasat newspaper, the country has been left without any independent media institution capable of fulfilling its watchdog role. The remaining media institutions operate under strict restrictions that prevent them from addressing numerous sensitive issues, foremost among them the “elephant in the room”: the war in the Gulf.

These restrictions also extend to the foreign press. The authorities require journalists to obtain prior authorization to enter the country for the purpose of journalistic coverage and demand that they specify the subjects of their visits, the issues they intend to cover, and the individuals they wish to interview. When these details do not meet with the authorities’ approval, they may delay issuing permits or refuse to grant them, claiming that “the time is not appropriate.”

In this atmosphere, citizens are afraid to express their opinions on social media, while journalists face restrictions that make them hesitate even to document what they see with their own eyes and report what is happening on the ground. Perhaps the most telling paradox of this reality emerged during the war, when air-raid sirens were sounding across the Kingdom while state television broadcast interviews with citizens affirming that they felt safe. The scene reflected the official narrative’s insistence on projecting reassurance, in contrast to the fear and anxiety expressed by citizens away from the cameras, as they found themselves caught in the midst of a devastating war in which military targets were intertwined with risks threatening civilian lives.