Sayed

Bahrain

The Gulf state of Bahrain has a long history of authoritarian government and political repression. In the Arab Spring of 2011, popular uprisings were crushed with the support of the Saudi military and there were widespread human rights violations by the Bahraini state.

During and since this time, the UK government has provided security and justice training to institutions that are implicated in severe abuses. It has also supported arms exports, despite Bahrain featuring on its own human rights watch list. Sayed Alwadaei is a Bahraini human rights activist who has suffered for speaking out against the dictatorship.