page_title: Human rights in Bahrain
section_title: Bahraini uprising (2011–present)
hierarchical_section_title: Human rights in Bahrain / Bahraini uprising (2011–present)
caption_attribution_description: Protester Abdulredha Buhmaid on floor bleeding from his head after army opened fire
context_page_description: Bahrain's record on human rights has been described by Human Rights Watch as "dismal", and having "deteriorated sharply in the latter half of 2010".
  The government of Bahrain has marginalized the native Shia Muslim population. Torture and forced disappearances are common in Bahrain. The crackdown on protesters during the 2011 Arab Spring has brought further human rights complaints, including the destruction of dozens of long-standing Shia mosques.
  The Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry was established on 29 June 2011 by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa to assess the incidents that occurred in the Kingdom during the period of unrest in February and March 2011 and the consequences of these events. The report was released on 23 November of that year and confirmed that there were some incidents of physical and psychological abuse on detainees. It has been criticized for not disclosing the names of individual perpetrators of abuses and extending accountability only to those who actively carried out human rights violations.
context_section_description: In February 2011, the tensions between the Sunni ruling minority and the Shi'a majority spilled over into street protests which was violently suppressed by police forces, resulting in multiple civilian deaths. McClatchy Newspapers/csmonitor.com reported that as of mid-May 2011, 
  Authorities have held secret trials where protesters have been sentenced to death, arrested prominent mainstream opposition politicians, jailed nurses and doctors who treated injured protesters, seized the health care system that had been run primarily by Shiites, fired 1,000 Shiite professionals and canceled their pensions, detained students and teachers who took part in the protests, beat and arrested journalists, and forced the closure of the only opposition newspaper.
  Physicians for Human Rights reported that during the 2011 uprising the Bahraini government initiated systematic and targeted attacks against medical personnel who had witnessed government atrocities while treating civilian protesters. In a report titled Do No Harm: A Call for Bahrain to End Systematic Attacks on Doctors and Patients, released in April 2011, Physicians for Human Rights documented violations of medical neutrality including the beating, abuse, and threatening of Shi'a physicians at Salmaniya Hospital; government security forces stealing ambulances and posing as medics; the militarization of hospitals and clinics, thus obstructing medical care; and rampant fear that prevented patients from seeking urgent medical treatment. Other key findings in the report included the use of excessive force against unarmed civilians and violent assaults on civilian detainees by government authorities and security forces.
  In May 2011, Richard Sollom, Deputy Director of Physicians for Human Rights, testified before the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, a bipartisan caucus of the US House of Representatives, at a hearing on Bahrain. He reported the abuses documented by Physicians for Human Rights and called upon Congress to take a stronger stance against human rights violations in Bahrain.
  An estimated 1000 Bahrainis have been detained since the uprising and Bahraini and international human rights groups have documented hundreds of cases of torture and abuse of Shia detainees. According to csmonitor.org, the government has gone beyond the crushing of political dissent to what "appears" to be an attempt to "psychologically humiliating the island's Shiite majority into silent submission."
  The Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry was established on 29 June 2011 by King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa to assess the incidents that occurred in the Kingdom during the period of unrest in February and March 2011 and the consequences of these events. The report was released on 23 November and confirmed the Bahraini government's use of torture and other forms of physical and psychological abuse on detainees. It has been criticized for not disclosing the names of individual perpetrators of abuses and extending accountability only to those who actively carried out human rights violations.
caption: Bahraini protesters shot by military, 2011
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