8 Feb 2012 | Middle East and North Africa
Yesterday, Bahraini authorities denied visas to a number foreign journalists ahead of the anniversary of Bahrain’s 14 February uprising. Journalists from the New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, the Wall Street Journal, the BBC, Associated Foreign Press, and Al-Jazeera English were all denied visas “due to the high volume of applications”. Local activists expect a violent crackdown on 14 February, as protesters have vowed to return to the now closed Pearl Roundabout.
Among the journalists refused visas are Adam Ellick and the New York Times’s Nicholas Kristof. Ellick told Index that members of Bahrain’s media office had previously assured him that he would be able to “come back anytime”. This pledge was made during Ellick’s last trip in December 2011, during which both he and Kristof were were detained while reporting on protests.
Kristen Chick, a correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor was also denied a visa yesterday. Like Kristof, she also reported from Bahrain during the crackdown.
On Twitter, the authority said it processed applications in the order that they were received, prioritising the earliest applications. The head of the Information Affairs Authority, Sheikh Fawaz, said that the government wanted to “[ensure] a wide range of international media here during this time”.
Last month, the Information Affairs Authority (IAA) sent Index a letter clarifying its stance on “media censorship,” boasting that 700 foreign journalists were allowed to enter the country to cover the Bahrain Air show. It is unclear how many journalists were allowed to enter the country to cover 14 February, but the IAA is insisting that they are allowing many foreign outlets to cover the anniversary of the uprisings. The IAA claim they have granted a number of foreign journalists visas to cover the anniversary, they named Voice of America, BBC, Reuters, Associated Press and Russia El Youm as major news sites allowed to enter the country to cover the anniversary of the uprisings in the tiny country.
Brian Dooley of Human Rights First, who was also denied a visa to enter the country in January, told the Los Angeles Times that “the government is only fuelling suspicions that they don’t want the rest of the world to see what’s going to happen”.
Maryam Al-Khawaja, Head of Foreign Affairs for the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights said that the denied visas were not “a good sign,” and added that it was “even more worrisome that NGOs are not being allowed in either”.
Last month, Dooley, Rick Sollom from Physicians for Human Rights and a delegation from Freedom House were all denied visas, and invited to return at the end of February. The e-mail denying visas to journalists also invited them to return at the end of February, when the “National Commissions work implementing the recommendations of the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI)” would be completed.
The Bahrain Centre for Human Rights anticipates an escalation in the protests on 14 February. Al-Khawaja said “high numbers of protesters will continuously attempt to access what was Pearl Square, and the government will use excessive violence to keep them out.”
21 Jan 2012 | Asia and Pacific, China
The defection of Chinese writer and dissident Yu Jie last week revealed shocking allegations of torture and beatings more usually associated with rogue American troops in Iraq.
Yu, a close friend of imprisoned Chinese writer Liu Xiaobo, is most famous for his mocking attack on the country’s premier, China’s Best Actor: Wen Jiabao, published in Hong Kong in late 2010.
Yu fled with his family to the US on 11 January. Shortly after, he held a press conference in Washington and released a written statement on why he had chosen to defect. Below we pick out the most shocking of these claims.
Though I was physically in China, I became an ‘exile at heart’ and a ‘non-existent person’ in the public space.
Illegal house arrests, torture, surveillance, tracking, and being taken on ‘trips’ became part of my everyday life.
Several of the plainclothes officials came at me again and began beating me in the head and the face without explanation. They stripped off all my clothes and pushed me, naked, to the ground, and kicked me maniacally. They also had a camera and were taking pictures as I was being beaten, saying with glee that they would post the naked photos online.
They forced me to kneel and slapped me over a hundred times in the face. They even forced me to slap myself. They would be satisfied only when they heard the slapping sound, and laughed madly. They also kicked me in the chest and then stood on me after I had fallen to the ground.
The head state security officer told him:
If the order comes from above, we can dig a pit to bury you alive in half an hour, and no one on earth would know… If the central authorities think that their rule is facing a crisis, they can capture [all China’s dissidents] in one night and bury them alive.
While the post-Tiananmen Square period was a time when Chinese dissidents defected in their droves, there is still a steady trickle of Chinese who seek refugee status overseas. Some of them leave legally, while others, who are denied passports or the right to leave smuggle themselves out, usually via Vietnam. They include fellow writer Liao Yiwu, who has been living in Germany since 2011; Chinese diplomat, Chen Yonglin, who fled to Australia in 2005; and AIDS activist Wan Yanhai, who left for the United States in 2010. The wife of Chinese dissident human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng, Geng He, has also been living in the US for the past two years. Her husband is currently serving a three-year prison sentence for violating probation rules, having been missing for more than a year.
13 Jan 2012 | Americas, Index Index, minipost
Bradley Manning, the US solider accused of the largest intelligence breach in American history, is moving closer to the possibility of spending the rest of his life in military confinement.The presiding officer over Manning’s pre-trial hearing recommended he be sent to a full court martial, following his alleged involvement in the WikiLeaks dump of state secrets. Colonel Paul Almanza, the investigating officer at last month’s hearing is believed to have written to his superiors recommending that all 22 charges against Manning be referred to a general court martial.
9 Jan 2012 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
Prominent human rights activist Nabeel Rajab was severely beaten by security services in Bahrain during a demonstration on Friday. Rajab was beaten on the back, head and neck and was taken by ambulance to Salmaniya hospital after participating in a peaceful protest in Manama. The activist, who is President of The Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) and Bahrain Centre for Human Rights (BCHR) told his lawyer that policemen gathered around him and began to beat him. Rajab has been released from hospital following treatment for concussion, back pain and bruises to his back and face.
