Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-01-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the human rights situation in Bahrain; and if he will make a statement.

Mr Tobias Ellwood

We regularly discuss human rights and reform with the Government of Bahrain -including at the biannual UK-Bahrain Joint Working Group meeting which was recently held in November 2015. The UK continues to encourage the Government of Bahrain to meet its human rights obligations and to honour all conventions to which it is a party. We welcome the progress made by Bahrain on their reform programme particularly in the areas of youth justice, the establishment and increasing effectiveness of the Ombudsman’s office, the Prisoner and Detainees’ Rights Commission and the reformed National Institute of Human Rights. We continue to work with the Government of Bahrain to ensure momentum and progress on its reforms, for the benefit of all Bahrainis.