Bahrain Opposition Leader Says Never Done Anything Harmful against Country

Rasa - Bahrain’s jailed opposition leader, Sheikh Ali Salman, said he has never done anything harmful against his country, refuting new accusations raised by the authorities against him.

News ID: 434818

Date: 16 November 2017 - 23:11

RNA - “I never practiced in anything that would harm this country,” Sheikh Salman said, adding that he had devoted his life to serving Bahrain, LuaLua TV reported.

The opposition leader, who has been in jail since December 2014 for allegedly inciting hatred against the regime, revealed that the authorities failed to inform him that he would be standing trial on espionage charges on November 27.

The new charges against him stem from a taped telephone conversation between Salman and Qatar’s former prime minister.

According to Manama’s prosecutors, the conversation is proof of Doha’s role in Bahrain’s popular uprising.
On Sunday, Bahrain’s Public Prosecution announced that the Secretary General of Al Wefaq would be returned to court after being accused of “spying for the state of Qatar”.

But the allegations have been widely discredited by the sheer fact that the recorded conversation, aired on Bahrain’s state-run TV in August, was part of a 2011 Saudi-US initiative aimed at resolving Bahrain’s political crisis.

Qatar played the role of a mediator within the framework of the initiative, which was backed by the Bahraini monarch.

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