I reported nine days ago that the Bahraini authorities had arrested politician Ebrahim Sharif following a visit to Bahrain by Prince Charles.
He was charged with “inciting hatred” against the Gulf monarchy’s rulers, and therefore facing a possible three-year jail sentence.
Now I’m delighted to report that the charges against him have been dropped, according to a tweet issued by Bahrain’s UK embassy.
Sharif was detained because he gave an interview to a US news agency, the Associated Press, in which he suggested that the prince’s day-long tour of the island kingdom could “whitewash” Bahrain’s crackdown on dissent.
The Bahraini chief prosecutor acted after receiving a complaint from the Cyber Crime Directorate about Sharif’s “alleged defamation of Bahrain’s constitutional system.”
The US state department called for the charges to be dropped, and Britain’s foreign office pledged to take up Sharif’s case with the Bahraini government.
Ebrahim (or Ibrahim) Sharif is the former leader of Bahrain’s secular National Democratic Action Society. He spent four years in prison until June 2015, was rearrested weeks later and sentenced to another year in prison for making a political speech.
