Manama: Bahrain’s Advocate General said that he would appeal a ruling by the High Criminal Court that acquitted anti-government activists Ali Salman Ali Ahmad, Hassan Ali Juma Sultan and Ali Mahdi Ali Al Aswad on charges of sharing intelligence with Qatar.
Osama Al Oufi said that although the public prosecution presented strong evidence that implicated the three defendants in deals with Qatari officials to fuel acts of sabotage and violence in the country during the dramatic events that unfolded in Bahrain in February and March 2011, the court did not assess them properly.
Evidence presented by the prosecution included records of tasks assigned by Qatari officials to the defendants that were substantiated by testimonies from witnesses, the advocate general said.
He added that the defendants and their lawyers could not refute the compelling evidence the prosecution had submitted.
Under Bahrain’s laws, the prosecution and the defendants can appeal a ruling at the Court of Appeals in the first stage and at the Cassation Court, the country’s highest court, in the second stage.
The three defendants were tried on charges of spying for a foreign country to carry out subversive acts against Bahrain and undermine its political and economic status and its national interests in order to topple the government.
Other charges include passing on defence secrets to a foreign country, accepting money from a foreign country in exchange for supplying military secrets and information related to the internal situation in the country, and broadcasting news and false and malicious rumours abroad to weaken financial trust in the kingdom and undermine its status.
Only Ali Salman is in custody, serving a jail sentence in another case since 2014.
The other two were tried in absentia.
