US Should Suspend Military Sales to Bahrain - Congressman

The US Department of State should suspend some weapons sales to Bahrain until the government in Manama ends its oppression of peaceful protesters, Congressman Ron Wyden said in a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Bahrain commits serious human rights abuses including torture and persecuting political and human rights activists, according to the US State Department’s annual human rights report which was released also on Thursday.

“Until the government of Bahrain makes real and meaningful progress to end the human rights violations and stops repressing the peaceful opposition, I will use my seat in the Senate to oppose any attempts to lift the ban [on arms sales].”

Wyden said the abuses in Bahrain “clearly are not the actions of a government that has reformed or is reforming.”

Bloomberg reported on June 15, 2015 that Secretary Kerry had informed Bahrain the United States would work to lift its four-year ban on selling arms to Manama despite its record of human rights violations, Wyden said.

Bahrain is a US ally in the Persian Gulf region and is the home port for the US Fifth Fleet.

Since 2011, the Sunni regime in Bahrain has been locked in a struggle with an opposition movement led primarily by Shiites, who constitute a majority of the country’s population.

The protesters have called for political freedom, equality and a parliamentary system that operates independently of Bahrain’s Sunni royal family.

In 2011, Wyden succeeded in blocking the sale of some US arms to Bahrain in response to the Manama government’s crackdown on peaceful protestors.