In These New Times

Things have moved on apace since Gates visit. The message is clear: no democracy in the Arab Peninsula. The Saudi invasion was cheerily reported by the BBC on Monday, then we had the shootings and now the opposition is being rounded up. It’s OK though: they’re hardliners.

Straits Times

17th March, 2011

BAHRAIN rounded up dissidents on Thursday as it came under mounting diplomatic pressure to end a bloody crackdown on Shiite-led protesters which has alarmed its ally the United States and infuriated Iran.

Five hardline Shiite activists and one Sunni were arrested during the night, a parliamentarian from the Shiite opposition alliance said, after a day of violence which left five dead in the Sunni-ruled kingdom.

‘They were arrested in the night,’ Khalil Marzouk, deputy leader of the Al-Wefaq opposition movement, told AFP.

Among those detained was Hassan Mashaima, a leader of the hardline Shiite Haq group which is seeking to overthrow the Sunni monarchy that has ruled the Shiite-majority island state for 230 years.

Mashaima only returned to Manama from abroad on Feb 26 after terrorism charges against him were dropped as part of an earlier peace offering from the government to the opposition.

Human rights activist and Haq member Abduljalil al-Singace, who was released in February after six months in jail, was also detained along with leftist activist Ibrahim Sharif, the opposition said. — AFP