Bahrain Mirror: The administration of Bahrain's Jaw Central Prison recently transferred several political prisoners to prison buildings designated for criminal inmates and placed some in isolation after they left to take exams and visit the prison infirmary.

Human rights defender Ebtisam Al-Sayegh stated in a post on the formerly Twitter "X" platform on Sunday, June 2, 2024, that what the prison administration did was "a punitive policy and a threat to anyone who thinks of claiming their right to leave for exams or to visit the infirmary or hospital, that their fate will be like those prisoners who have been missing since they left and have not returned, leading them to go on a hunger strike due to arbitrary isolation."

She pointed out that what the prison administration is doing "violates the law and human rights standards and is a very dangerous retaliatory escalation that infringes on the rights of political prisoners, at a time when the Bahraini authorities are trying to address some long-standing crises."

Al-Sayegh emphasized that "the kidnapping and isolation of prisoners in buildings with dangerous criminals will deprive many of them of completing their exams, causing them to lose more academic years, and will increase diseases and complications as prisoners will refuse to go to the infirmary or hospital to avoid the fate of their fellow inmates." She questioned, "Is this the intention of the prison administration with this behavior?"

She further noted that "if the authorities are unaware, it means giving the green light to the prison administration to break the law and take actions that exacerbate the situation without accountability," stressing that "this contradicts the authorities' display of efforts to improve the situation, not worsen it."

Arabic Version