Bahrain - Amnesty International calls for release of jailed Bahraini activists

Source: Press TV

Bahraini women hold portraits of female
 prisoners during an anti-regime rally
 in a western suburb of Manama. (File photo)

Amnesty International is calling for the release of more than two dozens of Bahraini human rights activists held in jails across the Persian Gulf kingdom.

Bahrain "cannot carry on imprisoning people simply because it can't take criticism," Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa program deputy director, said on Thursday. 

"It's time that people detained simply for exercising their right to freedom of expression be released and for the harassment of other activists to desist," she urged.

The call comes as Bahrainis mark the second anniversary of the country's revolution which started on February 14, 2011, against the ruling Al Khalifa family. 

Many rights activists in Bahrain are serving time, some even life terms, for expressing their anti-government views on social media or in street protests. 

A report published by the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry in November 2011 found that the Al Khalifa regime had used excessive force in its crackdown on protests and accused Manama of torturing political activists, politicians, and protesters. 

Physicians for Human Rights say doctors and nurses have been detained, tortured, or disappeared because they have "evidence of atrocities committed by the authorities, security forces, and riot police" in the crackdown on anti-government protests.