(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Civilians charged with genuine criminal offenses should be tried in an independent civilian court that meets international fair trial standards, HRW said in a statement posted on its website.
"Most defendants hauled before Bahrain's special military court are facing blatantly political charges, and trials are unfair," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.
"The Crown Prince may be sincere in his efforts to promote dialogue, but what good is that while back home the government is crushing peaceful dissent and locking up people who should be part of the dialogue."
HRW said the special military court began hearings on Monday against Matar Ibrahim Matar and Jawad Fairouz, former opposition members of parliament, without notifying their lawyers or families.
Human Rights Watch said it knows of 82 people for whom verdicts had been delivered in the special military court as of June 13, and of several dozen more whose cases are pending.
Of the 82, 77 were convicted on some charge; only five were fully acquitted.
Convictions for felony charges resulted in sentences ranging from five years to life, as well as two death sentences.
HRW said the special military court began hearings on Monday against Matar Ibrahim Matar and Jawad Fairouz, former opposition members of parliament, without notifying their lawyers or families.
Human Rights Watch said it knows of 82 people for whom verdicts had been delivered in the special military court as of June 13, and of several dozen more whose cases are pending.
Of the 82, 77 were convicted on some charge; only five were fully acquitted.
Convictions for felony charges resulted in sentences ranging from five years to life, as well as two death sentences.
"Most convictions were for patently political charges such as participating in unauthorised demonstrations and 'incitement of hatred against the regime', and resulted in prison sentences ranging from one to five years," HRW added in its statement.
International human rights bodies have determined that trials of civilians before military tribunals violate the right to be tried by a competent, independent, and impartial tribunal.
The Human Rights Committee, the international expert body authorised to monitor compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Bahrain ratified in 2006, has stated that civilians should be tried by military courts only under exceptional circumstances and only under conditions that genuinely afford full due process.
A Bahrain military court on Monday postponed the trial of 48 doctors arrested during a crackdown on anti-government protests, after their lawyers claimed they had been tortured in custody.
The doctors were among dozens of medical staff rounded up in the discriminate ruled Persian Gulf kingdom, following protests that erupted in February, led mostly by the country's Shi'ite majority.
The doctors, most of them Shi'ite, face charges ranging from stealing medicine and stockpiling weapons to seizing control of the country's main public hospital.
They pleaded not guilty at their second court hearing on Monday.
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