Bahrain court dissolves main opposition bloc

File photo showing a placard bearing the portrait of Sheikh Ali Salman, head of the Shiite opposition movement Al Wefaq, during a protest against his arreson May 29, 2016. A Bahraini court on July 17,Show more

A Bahraini court on Sunday ordered the kingdom’s main opposition group Al Wefaq to be dissolved, after authorities accused it of “harbouring terrorism”.

The administrative court in Manama also ordered the Shiite movement’s funds to be seized by the government, a judicial source said.

The justice ministry, which had requested dissolving Al Wefaq, accused the bloc of providing a haven for “terrorism, radicalisation and violence” and opening the way for “foreign interference” in the kingdom’s affairs.

It was an allusion to Iran, which Bahrain accuses of fomenting unrest among its Shiite majority.

Al Wefaq was the largest bloc in parliament before its lawmakers resigned in protest at the crushing of 2011 protests calling for an elected government.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE helped Bahrain quell the uprising, but low-level and occasionally violent unrest continues to roil the kingdom despite reforms put in place following the Arab Spring-inspired uprising.

The ruling comes despite appeals by the United Nations and United States for the legal process against the bloc to be dropped.

Authorities suspended Al Wefaq’s activities and froze its funds and assets on June 14, ordering its offices closed after accusing the group of creating “a new generation that carries the spirit of hatred” and having links with “sectarian and extremist political parties that adopt terrorism”.

On June 28, its defence lawyers withdrew from court proceedings in protest at the government’s push to accelerate the process, which was initially set for October 6.

Abdullah Al Shamlawi, a lawyer who had been defending Al Wefaq, said at the time that the order came “out of the blue”. He has denied all the allegations.

He and other members of the defence team pulled out of the case after the judge refused to allow them access to Al Wefaq’s offices to prepare their defence.

Al Wefaq draws most of its support from the Shiite majority in Bahrain.

Its chief, Shiite cleric Ali Salman, is serving a nine-year jail term for inciting violence after a court in May more than doubled his sentence.

His arrest in December 2014 sparked protests in Bahrain.

The order for Al Wefaq to be dissolved comes as the government cracks down on opponents.

Prominent human rights advocate Nabeel Rajab was detained last month and is now facing trial on charges of insulting a state institution, insulting a foreign country and disseminating false rumours in time of war.

Activist Zainab Al Khawaja, meanwhile, left Bahrain for Denmark last month after being released from prison on humanitarian grounds. Her activist father, Abdulhadi Al Khawaja, remains jailed on a life sentence for his role in the 2011 protests.

Also last month, authorities stripped the citizenship of the country’s leading Shiite cleric, Sheikh Isa Qassim, prompting protests by his supporters. Officials accuse him of creating a sectarian atmosphere and of forming groups that “follow foreign religious ideologies and political entities”.

Al Wefaq, also known as the Islamic National Accord Association, is heir to the Bahrain Freedom Movement which played a key role in Shiite-led anti-government protests of the 1990s that sought the restoration of the elected parliament scrapped in 1975.

The situation in Bahrain is raising alarm in Washington, while UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has expressed concern about the move against Al Wefaq.

* Agence France-Presse and Associated Press