Bahrain Mirror: The Curricula Department at the Bahraini Ministry of Education has included a lesson in the sixth grade "Citizenship" school book that talks about the popular protests in Bahrain in 2011 that demanded political reforms to put an end to the ruling Al Khalifa family's monopoly over power.

The lesson described the protests as acts of subversion, sabotage, and violence, which led to "the martyrdom of a number of policemen (...) and resulted in significant material and economic losses that affected all fields."

The book included a lesson about what it described as "martyrs of duty", referring to the policemen who died during clashes with protesters, whereas the book did not mention dozens of protesters who were killed as a result of torture or gunfire.

One of the objectives of the lesson, according to the book, is to encourage the student to "appreciate the role of the Royal Fund for Martyrs of Duty", a fund announced by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa to help the families of slain policemen.

A number of Pakistani, Yemeni and Emirati policemen have been killed in clashes with protesters in recent years.

The book also stated false incidents, including an incident in which it claimed that protesters severed the tongue of a Muezzin, which was denied by the report of an Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI).

The report issued by BICI, which was appointed by the King, indicated that the government used unjustified violence in their confrontation with protests, called for reforms in the security services and putting an end to the practice of torture in prisons.

The ministry ignored the report of the fact-finding commission, which is supposed to represent an official reference to events that the country witnessed.

Arabic Version