The US State Department came down hard on the small Gulf nation of Bahrain, also home to the US Fifth Fleet. In a report sent to Congress this week, the State Department says the government of Bahrain has not done enough to implement a series of political and human rights reforms. After Bahrain crushed pro-democracy protests in 2011, an independent commission said the Kingdom should do more to protect the freedom of expression, including non-violent dissent. The State Department report said Bahrain has made some progress in holding security forces accused of torture accountable but has not done enough to allow freedom of expression. US Senator Patrick Leahy slammed the Bahraini government for “torturing prisoners” and its “actions to silence opposition political leaders, to persecute human rights defenders, and to revoke the citizenship of a leading cleric.” The senator was referring to Bahrain’s most prominent Shia cleric Ayatollah Isa Qassim who was stripped of his citizenship on Tuesday.
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