Bahrain Mirror: A number of human rights groups on Thursday (26 October 2017) condemned the Second High Court of Appeals for the dissolution of the National Democratic Action Society (Wa'ad).

The Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR), Bahrain Forum for Human Rights (BFHR), Gulf Institute for Democracy and Human Rights (GIDHR), SALAM for Democracy and Human Rights, and the European-Bahraini Organization for Human Rights (EBOHR) said that this measure, along with other decisions that targeted a number of political and civil groups, is a another step towards burying freedom of political and civil work in Bahrain.

The rights organizations pointed out that the charges upon which the lawsuit was based were "tendentious and malicious", explaining that this retaliation was due to Wa'ad's exercise of their legitimate rights under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to freedom of political work and association.

The HR groups further highlighted that the Ministry of Justice's decision was based on the arbitrary restrictions imposed by the Political Associations Law, which allows the Ministry to intervene unjustifiably in the work of political associations, adding that there has been 9 lawsuits and procedures made by the authorities since 201, ranging from prosecutions to suspensions and dissolutions.

The organizations explained that Wa'ad is the third political society to be dissolved after the National Islamic Al-Wefaq Society and the Islamic Action Society, let alone the prosecutions or crackdown against a number of Wa'ad officials.

The groups also stressed that the measure taken against Wa'ad reveals once again the lack of judicial independence and confirms that Bahrain's political arena is much darker than before.

Arabic Version