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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 MANAMA 001156 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/27/2016 
TAGS: PTER PREL PGOV ASEC BA BILAT CTR POL
SUBJECT: COURT RULES CHARGES AGAINST SUNNI EXTREMIST CELL 
UNCONSTITUTIONAL 
 
REF: A. CAIRO 3901 
     ¶B. MANAMA 0766 
 
Classified by Ambassador William T. Monroe for reasons 1.4 
(b) and (d). 
 
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Summary 
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¶1.  (C) Bahrain's constitutional court issued a decision June 
26 that the conspiracy charges filed against four Sunni 
extremists are unconstitutional, citing a conflict between 
Article 157 of the penal code and Article 20 of the 
constitution.  The constitution requires that only "acts" be 
punished while the penal code says participating in an 
agreement with the intent to commit a felony constitutes 
criminal activity.  High profile attorneys Farid Ghazi and 
Abdullah Hashem publicly expressed their satisfaction with 
the ruling, saying it demonstrated the judicial sector's 
independence.  Salafi MP Mohammed Khalid said the accused had 
no connection to Al Qaida or other terrorist groups. 
Meanwhile, a draft CT law continues to bounce between the 
full Council of Representatives (COR) and the COR committee 
with responsibility for it.  The court ruling and lack of 
movement on the CT law demonstrate that the Bahraini 
government faces serious limitations in using the legal 
system to clamp down on suspected terrorists.  The Ambassador 
will urge senior Bahraini policymakers to develop policy 
responses to deal with extremists.  End Summary. 
 
----------------------------------- 
Conspiracy Charges Unconstitutional 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (SBU) Bahrain's constitutional court June 26 ruled that 
the charges against four Bahrainis accused of planning to 
carry out terrorist attacks were unconstitutional.  The 
ruling effectively ends the prosecution of members of a Sunni 
extremist cell originally arrested in June 2004 on charges of 
plotting bomb attacks on government, economic, and tourist 
establishments.  Four cell members - Mohieddin Khan, Yaser 
Kamal, Bassam Ali, and Bassam Bokhowa - continued to face 
charges, while two others arrested at the same time, Omar 
Kamal and Mohammed Saleh, had charges against them dropped in 
late 2004.  Procedurally, the case against the four now moves 
back to the criminal court, which should dismiss the case 
based upon the constitutional court decision.  No date has 
yet been set for the criminal court hearing. 
 
¶3.  (SBU) The court ruled in favor of the arguments of the 
lawyers for the accused, who said that Article 157 of the 
penal code of 1976, under which the suspects were charged, 
conflicts with Article 20 of the constitution of 2002.  The 
operative passage of Article 157 reads, "A prison sentence 
shall be the penalty for any person who participates in an 
agreement with the intent of committing any of the felonies 
provided for in Articles 147 to 155..."  Article 20 of the 
constitution says, "There shall be no crime and no punishment 
except under a law, and punishment only for acts committed 
subsequent to the effective date for the law providing for 
the same."  The court concurred with the argument that 
"agreement with the intent of committing" a felony conflicts 
with the constitutional requirement that "acts" be committed. 
 
------------------------------------------- 
Attorneys Express Satisfaction with Outcome 
------------------------------------------- 
 
¶4.  (SBU) Attorneys for the accused publicly greeted the 
decision with satisfaction.  Farid Ghazi, MP and lawyer for 
one of the cell members, told the press that the verdict 
"reinforces my trust in the court and shows that judges are 
free to make decisions without any interference."  Attorney 
and politician Abdullah Hashem said publicly that he had been 
certain the court would deliver this verdict.  He commented 
that there are two aspects of any crime - the material and 
the abstract.  In this case, he claimed, there was no 
material aspect, and an intention to commit an act is not a 
crime.  Salafi MP Mohammed Khalid, an outspoken supporter the 
accused, told reporters that by taking the decision, the 
courts proved that they are not under any influence.  He 
stated that the accused had no connection to Al Qaida or 
other terrorist groups and never intended to harm public 
property.  One of the accused, Mohieddin Khan, told the press 
that the ruling "proves the Bahraini judiciary is impartial 
and does not succumb to external pressures." 
 
¶5.  (C) In a conversation with Poloff prior to the ruling, 
Attorney Rabab Al Arrayedh said that she had initiated the 
 
MANAMA 00001156  002 OF 002 
 
 
constitutional court challenge on behalf of her client 
Bokhowa.  Ghazi, who represents Khan, and Hashem, who 
represents Kamal and Ali, took the opportunity to file 
appeals similar to Al Arrayedh's on behalf of their clients. 
She said that she incorporated into her strategy a legal 
precedent from a 2002 Egyptian constitutional court ruling 
that struck down a conspiracy law similar to Article 157. 
 
--------------------------------- 
CT Law Bouncing Around Parliament 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶6.  (C) Meanwhile, the elected lower house Council of 
Representatives continues to struggle with a draft 
counter-terrorism law.  The government originally passed the 
law to the COR in late 2004, but the COR returned it to the 
government, complaining that it employed an overly broad 
definition of terrorism and applied penalties that were too 
harsh.  The law bounced between the government and COR 
several times until the Foreign Affairs, Defense, and 
National Security Committee agreed to review it.  Committee 
chair Ahmad Behzad told the Ambassador in April that he was 
confident the bill would pass, although he noted that the 
committee had changed the name to "Protection of Society 
Security Law" to focus public attention on protecting the 
people rather than on fighting terrorism (Ref B). 
 
¶7.  (C) Since the time of the Ambassador's meeting, the bill 
moved to the full COR but without Article 18, which deals 
with conspiracy.  The COR decided to return it to the 
committee.  The bill moved to the COR a second time, and MPs 
again returned it to committee, where it now sits.  Shia MP 
Mohammed Al Shaikh June 26 told Poloff that "no one" in the 
COR supports the bill.  Sunnis MPs believe it was drafted to 
target Sunni Islamists, and Shias oppose it because it is 
reminiscent of the old State Security Law of the 1970s-1990s, 
under which security organs committed human rights 
violations, mainly against Shia Bahrainis.  The bill may be 
passed as a result of pressure from the government, but at 
this time it is unclear if it would include an article 
criminalizing conspiracy.  Even if it did, that provision 
could be found to be unconstitutional, given the June 26 
court decision. 
 
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Comment 
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¶8.  (C) The constitutional court ruling and uncertain status 
of the draft CT law in parliament demonstrate that the GOB 
faces serious limitations currently in its ability to use the 
legal system to clamp down on suspected terrorists.  Given 
the Bahraini judicial sector's reliance upon Egyptian laws 
and legal experts, news that that the Egyptian government is 
looking at the PATRIOT Act as a possible model for a CT law 
and has at least two separate committees developing a bill 
for parliament (Ref A) could have a beneficial impact in 
Bahrain in the longer term.  In the meantime, we -- in 
coordination with NAVCENT -- will continue to press senior 
Bahraini interlocutors on the need to  develop policy 
prescriptions for dealing with the extremists that both they 
and we know are present in the country. 
 
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Visit Embassy Manama's Classified Website: 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/manama/ 
********************************************* ******** 
MONROE