About 2,500 state workers in Bahrain have been fired from their jobs for taking part in recent protests against the ruling of Al-Khalifa dynasty. The firings have reportedly affected a total of over 13,000 people in the Persian Gulf sheikhdom.
Rights groups have criticized the Bahraini regime and state-linked firms for unlawfully terminating employees. Meanwhile, 40 people detained in connection with anti-regime protests have been formally charged with illegal assembly and trying to distort Bahrain’s image.
These developments mark continuing abuse by the US-supported Bahraini dictatorship. After initially responding with brutal violence and martial law to counter the largely peaceful uprisings, Bahrain then arrested and charged medical professionals for having treated injured protesters as patients.
The US still supports the Bahrain government, allocating another $26 million in aid for 2012, plus supplying them with military equipment, even while Obama administration officials have struggled to justify it. Bahrain is the host of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet, which directs operations from in the Persian Gulf, Red Sea, and Arabian Sea and secures the Straits of Hormuz, through which 40 percent of the world’s seaborne oil passes.
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