The seven men who will go on trial in Bahrain on Thursday will make history as the country’s first-ever civilians to be tried before a military court. Facing the death penalty, they’ve been sequestered in an unknown location for weeks and accused of murdering two policemen by running them over with a car. They’ve had no communication with family or friends since being taken into custody last month. Human rights activists fear they have been subjected to torture. More worrisome, they have been denied access to legal counsel and face trial proceedings sealed to the public. The Bahrain News Agency said the seven men have pleaded not guilty to all charges against them.
It is the first trial to be publicly announced since the country fell under martial law on March 15, when the Sunni regime began a severe crackdown on the opposition, a campaign that has seen about 500 mostly Shi’a anti-government supporters arrested and held incommunicado. “Putting civilians to military court is a surprise,” says Nabeel Rajab, head of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights. “The government has taken it too far.” Rights advocates fear that a conviction in this case may start a wave of death penalties for activists in the island Kingdom, which has rarely imposed such a sentence. The last time Bahrain handed out a death penalty was two years ago.
