The Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) welcomes the release of two human rights defenders in Syria and Bahrain this week.  Jdea Abdullah Nawfal, who is the executive director of the Syrian Centre for Democracy and Civil Rights was released in Syria, and Ghada Jamsheer, who is the President of the Women’s Petition Committee (WPC) was released in Bahrain.

On 16 December 2014, the second investigation judge in rural Damascus approved the release of Nawfal. The Public Prosecution appealed this ruling and the case was transferred to a referral judge who on 17 December 2014 confirmed the release and rejected the prosecutor’s appeal.

Nawfal was arrested at the immigration office close to the Syrian-Lebanese border on 31 October 2014 by members of the governmental security forces, when he was heading to Damascus after attending a human rights workshop in Beirut. Nawfal is 63 years old and has been working in the field of human rights since 1989.

In Bahrain, on 15 December 2014, Ghada Jamsheer was released from jail on the charge of assaulting a police woman, which is only one of 12 cases she is facing. She is currently under house arrest as she awaits her hearing on 14 January 2015.

Jamsheer, a well-known women’s rights defender, is President of the WPC, a network of Bahraini women human rights defenders who campaign for the codification of Bahrain’s family laws and their reform. She was summoned for interrogation on 9 September 2014 in relation to her tweets about corruption at King Hamad University Hospital, headed by a member of the ruling family. She was released on 27 November then directly re-arrested until her release this month.

The release of both Nawfal and Jamsheer comes at a time when thousands of others continue to be imprisoned and targeted on trumped up charges in both Syria and Bahrain, including GCHR founder Abdulhadi Al-Khawaja, jailed for life in Bahrain, and other human rights defenders jailed on lengthy sentences in both countries.

The GCHR has been closely following many cases of human rights defenders in both countries and has noticed a certain trend of judicial harassment towards them connected solely with their human rights work. The arbitrary arrest and detention of Nawfal and Jamsheer were directly linked to their peaceful and legitimate activities in the field of human rights and were nothing but attempts to obstruct their human rights work.

GCHR welcomes the release of both Nawfal and Jamsheer, however we fear that the systematic trend adopted by governments around the region, which includes the targeting of civil society and humanitarian activists and directing baseless charges against human rights defenders and their constant judicial harassment through trials lacking legal procedures and the international standards required for fair trials, is ascending. Thus we urge the governments of Syria and Bahrain to:

1. Stop targeting Jdea Nawfal as well as stop the judicial harassment against Ghada Jamsheer and drop all charges against her;
2. Immediately and unconditionally release all the detained human rights defenders and the rest of the activists in Bahrain and Syria;
3. Guarantee in all circumstances that all human rights defenders in Syria and Bahrain are able to carry out their legitimate activities without fear of reprisals and free of all restrictions including judicial harassment.  

The GCHR respectfully reminds you that the United Nations Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, adopted by consensus by the UN General Assembly on 9 December 1998, recognises the legitimacy of the activities of human rights defenders, their right to freedom of association and to carry out their activities without fear of reprisals. We would particularly draw your attention to Article 6 (c) which states that: Everyone has the right, individually and i association with others: (c) To study, discuss, form and hold opinions on the observance, both in law and in practice, of all human rights and fundamental freedoms and, through these and other appropriate means, to draw public attention to those matters and to Article 12.2, which provides that the State shall take all necessary measures to ensure the protection by the competent authorities of everyone, individually and in association with others, against any violence, threats, retaliation, de facto or de jure adverse discrimination, pressure or any other arbitrary action as a consequence of his or her legitimate exercise of the rights referred to in the present Declaration.