Drewery Dyke is SALAM DHR’s partnerships lead. He has been engaged with SALAM DHR since 2017, and has worked on human rights issues in the Gulf, Iran and Afghanistan for over 25 years.
Sayed Yusuf Almuhafdha is a Bahraini human rights activist and blogger, living in exile in Germany.
Like other country entries, the Bahrain chapter of the 2024 U.S. State Department Report on Human Rights Practices fails to provide an authoritative or realistic account of the human rights situation in the country. The structural, thematic changes that the Department of State has imposed on the country reports delink text assessing adherence to international human rights standards and subordinate the exercise to one reflecting short-term political goals. The report does the Bahraini people a disservice by jettisoning efforts to advance international human rights standards, simultaneously harming long-term U.S. interests.
Bahrain's report distorts developments in 2024, overemphasizing and inventing positive developments without acknowledging issues and cases that previous reports highlighted. The State Department reiterates the opaque and ambiguous legal provisions relied upon by the Government of Bahrain (GoB) to carry out arbitrary arrests: namely, "public morals," "defying authorities" and "national security." The 2024 report describes these subjects as "sensitive" instead of acknowledging that such laws aim to control public spaces and suppress essential freedoms—even those of children.
Nevertheless, the release of over 2,500 prisoners is a welcome development, including more than 800 prisoners held unjustly for political participation and peaceful free expression, or those convicted following unfair trials—as cited by Human Rights Watch. The releases help address decades of national concern over prison conditions, during which there have been repeated deaths in custody.
Yet the 2024 report on Bahrain omitted outstanding and new cases of arbitrary imprisonment, including unfair arrests and trials in previous years, such as the ongoing detention of 10 political figures unfairly imprisoned in 2011. A military court convicted them on charges including "setting up terror groups to topple the regime and change the constitution." Cases included longstanding political prisoners Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, Hassan Mushaima, Dr. Abduljalil al-Singace and Sheikh Ali Salman.
According to Amnesty International, a court convicted seven individuals in March for participating in a pro-Palestine protest in Sanabis on Nov. 2, 2023. The court sentenced them without credible evidence under broad and vague domestic laws that violate basic international human rights standards. Per Amnesty, "The only evidence used to convict were statements from officers of the Ministry of the Interior and the claim that five of the defendants had 'confessed' under interrogation. Four of the five 'confessions' were made by children, including two 15-year-olds."
Bahrain's report distorts developments in 2024, overemphasizing and inventing positive developments without acknowledging issues and cases that previous reports highlighted.
- Sayed Yusuf Almuhafdha and Drewery Dyke
Additional examples abound. In March 2024, the GoB arrested political and human rights activist Ebrahim Sharif—former leader of the banned Wa'ad party (the National Democratic Labour Action Society)—over peaceful social media posts critical of investment policies. It was the second time in less than a year that the authorities detained him for peaceful political expression online. In July 2024, the authorities detained at least five individuals for chanting, "We demand the release of the prisoners," and other political slogans, releasing them in September.
Due to the exclusion of a children's rights section, the report does not mention cases of arbitrary detention and ill-treatment of children, as documented by Human Rights Watch. Nor does it discuss systematic shortcomings in the Juvenile Justice Law. The report does not state that this law fails to provide adequate protection from violations, such as rejecting the right to a lawyer, to have a guardian present during investigations or the detention of minors instead of their rehabilitation, as stipulated under Bahraini law.
Also ignored are the multiple instances of well-documented efforts to delay or deny access to medical care for prisoners. Bahraini activists and human rights organizations describe the policy as a slow-death policy, which the authorities applied to al-Khawaja and al-Singace, among others.
Despite comprehensive evidence and a variety of sources, the government's account is presented as authoritative, even in the absence of evidence. Further, the report relies on the repeated use of the term "alleged" to denigrate objectively verifiable evidence that multiple independent sources—including U.N. human rights bodies—view as legitimate.
Since the template for the 2024 country reports does not cover travel bans, it failed to register cases like religious orator, Mahdi Sahwan, whose right to express his religion was curtailed by the Bahraini government's ban on his travel in July 2024.
The report avoids referring to systematic sectarian discrimination against Shia citizens, a topic addressed in previous DoS reports. The 2024 report mentions the word "Shia" only once, in the context of the detention of a person accused of offending Shia citizens. It ignores widespread practices of discrimination against Shia citizens and residents in Bahrain. This includes exclusion from participation in elections and from senior positions, restrictions on religious freedoms and deprivation of educational opportunities on a sectarian basis, reflected through royal and administrative appointments.
Despite members of the Trump administration asserting a commitment to free speech, the report fails to acknowledge that the GoB imposes draconian restrictions on freedom of expression. Independent media is nonexistent. The Minister of Social Development arbitrarily restricts registration of non-governmental organizations and has restricted or closed youth associations because of their political affiliations or positions.
Despite comprehensive evidence and a variety of sources, the government's account is presented as authoritative, even in the absence of evidence. Further, the report relies on the repeated use of the term "alleged" to denigrate objectively verifiable evidence.
- Sayed Yusuf Almuhafdha and Drewery Dyke
The report does not address the continued existence of 434 stateless persons in Bahrain. The GoB arbitrarily stripped these people of their citizenship, in contravention of international standards. We acknowledge, however, that the government has—for the moment—halted new citizenship revocation decisions.
Despite the Secretary of State being a former elected official, the report omits references to freedom to participate in the political process. The 2024 report fails to address flaws in Bahrain's electoral system, which have marginalized the parliamentary representation of Shia Bahrainis.
For example, it failed to address the suspension and later expulsion of elected House of Representatives member Mohamed Rafiq al-Husaini. On April 30, 2024, he called for national reconciliation and for the release of arbitrarily detained, former al-Wefaq (a political party banned in 2017) leader Sheikh Ali Salman, as well as other prisoners, in a speech on the floor of the House of Representatives.
In July 2024, al-Husaini was stripped of his membership in the House of Representatives. Despite having been previously vetted, the court determined that he held Pakistani and Bahraini citizenship—illegal under Bahraini law. At the time, Islamabad did not recognize him as a Pakistani national, arguing he had lived in Bahrain with Bahraini citizenship for decades. In August, the Court of Cassation stripped him of his citizenship and deported him to Pakistan. His current whereabouts and conditions are not known.
Ultimately, the Bahrain country report contains factually dubious and false assertions that serve to advance a politically friendly narrative of the Bahraini government. Its executive summary eschews references to systematic violations that took place in 2024, focusing on so-called "positive steps" taken to hold officials accountable for violations. It does not state which officials, violations or institutions conducted the investigations or the result. To our knowledge, there were no such judgments in 2024 against officials involved in violations, and none that Bahraini media cited.
In September 2021, then-Senator Marco Rubio co-authored and signed a joint, seven-Senator letter to then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The bipartisan letter raised "concerns about the government of Bahrain's troubling human rights record." The senators asserted "deep concern about the impact this violent repression has on Bahrain's citizens and on the country's longer-term stability," noting that "Bahrain's violent, systemic repression will breed resentment and instability."
Today, Secretary of State Marco Rubio appears to have thrown away such concerns, both internationally and domestically.
Internationally, the administration's revised country reporting includes the wholesale removal of thematic areas addressed in previous reports. One report highlights that themes removed from the 2023 edition include "respect for the integrity of the person, including arbitrary arrest or detention;" "denial of fair public trial;" "respect for civil liberties, including the suppression of information relating to libel and slander laws;" "the use of national security provisions [as pretext for punishing critics];" "freedom of peaceful assembly and association;" all references to "freedom to participate in the political process;" "gender discrimination and societal abuse, including rape, domestic violence and gender-based violence;" "children, including birth registration, education;" and "medical care and child abuse or neglect."
Suppression of such thematic areas delinks the State Department report from international human rights standards. Since the report possesses neither footnotes nor references, it is also impossible to assess the character of its assertions.
Thus, the administration reflects its disregard for international human rights standards, prioritizing short-term, transactional political goals. The Feb. 4 White House announcement that it would leave the U.N. Human Rights Council dismayed human rights advocates. Another example is Bahraini Crown Prince and Prime Minister Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa's July 16 visit to the White House and the reported $17 billion investment package he announced. Enduring commitments to good governance, including adherence to international law, are absent by design.
The Aug. 28 withdrawal from the U.N.'s Universal Periodic Review (UPR)—a non-binding, state-to-state peer review of every country's human rights record, held every four years—likewise reflects the administration's disdain for international processes, however flawed they may be.
A January State Department statement asserted that assistance to Bahrain is "in a manner that respects the human rights of its citizens." However, human rights and democracy advocates in Bahrain, the Gulf and across the world increasingly understand that the Trump administration unabashedly prioritizes economic and security interests over enduring human rights and democratic values, disregarding that such values underscore Bahrain's national security, which has witnessed decades of cyclical socio-political unrest as a result.
Activists in Bahrain and the Gulf ask how an America that erodes freedoms and democracy will be "great again." That said, a key opportunity for Rubio and this administration to make good on the concerns then-Senator Rubio set out in 2021 remains. Washington must make clear to the GoB that it needs to improve, genuinely allowing citizens to take part in public affairs. As 2025 ends and 2026 begins, that starts with Bahrain holding free and fair elections.
