Bahrain to Drop Charges Against Some Protestors

Bahrain will drop charges against some of the opposition protestors arrested during a crackdown and pay compensation to prisoners abused by security forces, the King Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa said Sunday in a nationally broadcast speech. “Today the country has the duty to move past its differences towards unity in a world that recognizes power, which can be achieved through alliances built upon unity and cohesion,” Hamad said in the address more than six months after his regime, with Saudi help, suppressed mass protests led by the country’s marginalized Shiite majority seeking greater rights. Bahrain’s Shiites make up about 70% of the Sunni-ruled kingdom’s 525,000 citizens.