AhlulBayt News Agency

source : Press TV
Wednesday

3 August 2011

7:30:00 PM
257577

MSF censures Bahrain police for raid

An international medical group has censured Bahrain's police for attacking its offices, detaining one staff member and seizing equipment.

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Wednesday that the staff member was detained last week after he called an ambulance to treat a man who had come to MSF premises with a serious head injury.

"It is MSF's obligation to provide treatment regardless of a patient's ethnicity, religion, or political affiliation," MSF said in a statement posted on its website.

"It now appears that in Bahrain today, acting within the common boundaries of the duty of care principle... is no longer possible without negative repercussions on MSF's ability to work in the country," it added.

Anti-regime protesters have been holding demonstrations across Bahrain since mid-February, calling on the ruling Al Khalifa regime to relinquish power.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International said two Bahraini women activists imprisoned and allegedly tortured for their involvement in protests had begun a hunger strike to demand their release, Reuters reported.

Roula al-Saffar, head of the Bahrain Nursing Society, and Jalila al-Salman, vice president of the Bahrain Teachers' Association, have been held for several months, according to the rights group.

"(Their) decision to go on hunger strike is a desperate attempt to protest against their imprisonment and the way they have been treated," said Philip Luther, a regional deputy director at Amnesty International.

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