Press Release: New trial against Nabeel Rajab to start on October 19

Mr. Rajab had just returned to Bahrainfollowing an international advocacy tour at the United Nations and EuropeanUnion, and there are strong reasons to believe that he has been targeted inparticular due to his advocacy for human rights violations committed in hiscountry in violation of international human rights standards.

Mr. Rajab had recently been released fromprison after completing a two year sentence (see background information). Inanother case, he had already been tried on similar charges in relation totweets deemed to be insulting to the Ministry of Interior, before beingacquitted.

In 2013, the United Nations Working Groupon Arbitrary Detention (UN WGAD) had found that Mr. Rajab's detention wasarbitrary, following a previous conviction related to his freedom of opinion,expression and assembly. The UN WGAD had concluded that the “domestic laws ofBahrain (…) seem to deny persons the basic right to freedom of opinion,expression”.

Such ongoing judicial harassment and arbitrary detention is one moreevidence of the continued criminalisation of human rights defenders'activities. This particular case has drawn the attention of many institutions,NGOs and third countries. The Observatory intended to send a trial observationmission for the October 19 hearing, but could not get a response in time fromthe authorities to guarantee its trial observer an unhindered access to thecountry. Thus, the Observatory calls on the authorities to facilitate theaccess to the country for international trial observers by guaranteeing theautomatic issue of visas.

Formore information, please contact:

· FIDH: Arthur Manet/AudreyCouprie: + 33 (0) 1 43 55 25 18

· OMCT: Miguel Martin: +41 22809 49 24