Bahrainis should forge unity against Manama regime, pundit says

Press TV has interviewed Syed Ali Wasif, the president of the Society for International Reforms and Research from Washington, on death sentences against activists in Bahrain.

Following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: This is not the first time Bahraini dissidents have been sentenced to death over and under claims of being tortured and made to falsely confess under duress.

Wasif: Yes, that is the case with every authoritarian regime in the [Persian] Gulf region – Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates and so on.

So this is nothing new. Whenever you have an authoritarian, totalitarian regime, an absolute monarchy, which is the case with Bahrain, you will see such actions or reactions to peaceful demonstrations.

So the unfortunate thing is, on the one hand, the double standard of the West, the Western democracy and democratic ideals and the United Nations as well. On the one hand, the Western leaders, they talk about democracy, they talk about civil rights and liberties and human rights and the right to assemble and right to politics and so on.

On the other hand, they have selected states and people with whom they have forged some kind of unity, some kind of alliances.

So they only allow those regimes or those allies, with whom they have good understanding and who promote their democratic ideals in those countries. Same is the case with Bahrain.

Bahrain is a US and Western satellite state in that region. It holds the fifth American naval fleet as well as now it is opening up to the British bases as well.

Press TV: Who speaks up for the people of Bahrain? Who can bring the international pressure required for the Al Khalifa regime to change and bring about those reforms that people are asking for?

Wasif: Nobody except for the people of Bahrain themselves. So the people of Bahrain, they have to forge unity, one leadership, and they have to assert pressure against the regime.

And I have been giving suggestions and advice from time to time to both the people of Bahrain and the people of Saudi Arabia that in order for them to gain liberty, freedom, from these blood-sucking regimes, they should have exile governments, either in Russia or in some African state.

Other than that nobody is going to help them. So the unfortunate thing is you see there is no judicial system in Bahrain, same is the case with Saudi Arabia or other monarchies of the [Persian] Gulf.

So you cannot expect any kind of justice from those judicial systems which are complicit.

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