Bahrain’s prominent rights activist, Nabeel Rajab, is to remain in custody and go on trial for posting tweets that Manama has described as insulting to the authorities in the Persian Gulf monarchy.
Public Prosecution Attorney General Hussein al-Buali said on Thursday that Rajab is charged with “publicly insulting government institutions,” after complaints by the defense and interior ministries over his comments on Twitter.
Rajab, who heads the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, was freed in May after completing a two-year jail term for organizing and participating in anti-regime protests.
However, he was arrested again on October 1 over his tweets and is set to stand trial on October 19.
In one of his tweets, the activist said Bahrainis joining extremists in Syria had originally been members of the Al Khalifa regime’s security forces.
“Many Bahrain men who joined terrorism and ISIS (ISIL) came from security institutions and those institutions were the first ideological incubator,” he wrote.
Bahrain has been the scene of anti-regime protests since mid-February 2011. Thousands of pro-democracy protesters have held numerous demonstrations in the streets of the country, calling for the Al Khalifa royal family to relinquish power.
On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates entered the country to assist the Bahraini government in its crackdown on protesters.
According to local sources, scores of people have been killed during the government’s heavy-handed suppression of peaceful protests.
