(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Dozens of prisoners have been abused in jail for taking part in anti-regime demonstrations. The inmates have filed a lawsuit against the government, saying they were tortured and put in solitary confinement by the regime. The crackdown on dissent continues across Bahrain more than ten months into a popular uprising against the ruling Al Khalifa dynasty. Dozens of demonstrators have been killed by the Saudi-backed regime forces since massive anti-governments erupted in February. We talked with Mohsen Saleh, a professor at the Lebanese University, to further discuss the issue. What follows is the transcription of the interview: Q: Professor Saleh, we are hearing that a Bahraini rights group calling on the interior ministry in Bahrain to investigate those human rights violations in prisons. Of course, we do remember that Bahrain Committee earlier on saying that it has proof showing that there is torture and there is abuse and excessive force being used against the protesters. But basically what has been done in the face of these allegations from the side of the Bahraini authorities? Saleh: Unfortunately, the authorities and the international organizations and the Arab League have not done anything to probe and investigate not the allegations [but] the facts and realities and more than that of course studied by this committee and also unfortunately, the Bahraini authorities is continuing in its atrocities and attack of the demonstrators and even the houses and the sacred places, the mosques and killing the children and the women and the elderly. This really shed light on how the mentality of this monarchy think about the situation in Bahrain at a time when the Arabs and some of the [Persian] Gulf Sheikhs go and help this regime. I would ask here the international community --Ban ki-Moon and the Americans and the West-- if they could not invade the mind of the Bahrainis, would they kill them all. This is the humanity of the West and the culture of the West and the culture of the United States. If they are claiming that they are using the people, let them see the Bahrainis. Every day they go in demonstrations and they show that they have human rights and they have to speak, let the help them. All they want [is] the fifth fleet to stay in Bahrain and also the so-called [Persian] Gulf shield to stay in Bahrain and commit all these crimes against humanity in Bahrain. I guess I see that the Bahrainis are invincible and very strong and they are continuing. Ten months and they want to get fatigued because they have the will to say that we draw our destiny, nobody, no intervention either from the Gulf or from the Americans or from the fifth fleet or from the CIA can draw us back from continuing our demonstrations to achieve our demands in first of all the participation in the political life, second they have to of course express their mind in terms of religious rights and in terms of their political rights and the expression of speech. Q: Mr. Saleh, you referred to the Arab League in your comments as well as the international community. We are seeing of course the Arab League getting involved in the situation in Syria, for instance, stepping in and trying to push for a solution to the unrest there. However, we are not seeing that role again in Bahrain and as you just mentioned, we are not seeing that role either from the Arab League members or from the side of the international community. We also saw the Bahraini king visiting the UK, for instance. Of course, we do not know what that visit was mainly about and what was said between the sides but does this mean that as long as this international support tacit or direct for the Bahraini regime continues that the uprising in Bahrain is not going to lead to where it led for instance in the case of Egypt or Libya? Saleh: Of course that is the demonstration that this Arab League is an American League, is a Western League; it is not an Arab League. That is why they do such things. They go where the Americans want them to go. They do not go to places like Bahrain or like what is happening in Yemen in order to save the people from the atrocities of the regime and when the king goes to or tries to show his ugly face to the British and to the American authorities, I guess he is trying to say to them I am protecting your interests. So this man --the king and his entourage-- do not really protect the interests of the Bahrainis. That is why we see the Bahrainis go to the streets everyday in order to tell this regime and who are behind this regime that we are continuing and we are insisting on our freedom and we want changes to take place, to occur, in Bahrain and in other places. When the Arab League goes to Syria, the Americans want them to go to Syria, although most of the people, the majority of the people, are behind the political reformation from the president and the regime. At least, there is something and a political life in Syria but in Bahrain and in Yemen and some of these Sheikhs countries there is nothing. There is only atrocities, prisons and nobody can say any word. That is why the Americans and the West are using hypocrisy and they are not for democracy or for reformation. They are behind some gangs in order to put the Arab people down and tell them we dictate policies in the region and the Bahrainis and of course the Syrians and the Lebanese and the Palestinians and of course will the Egyptians do the same thing, I guess, to say we are Arabs; we have our issues; we have our problems; we can go and demonstrate and do achieve many things for us not for the Americans or for the Israelis. That is why Bahrain is probably one of the American bases and finally Israeli bases because we know there is no difference between the American interests and the Israeli interests, on the contrary, they have the same interest in the region.
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