Secretary Pompeo Fails to Publicly Address Human Rights Issues During Bahrain Visit

15 January 2019 – On 8 January 2019, United States (US) Secretary of State Mike Pompeo embarked on a week-long trip to the Middle East and Arab Gulf, where he met with various leaders and high-level officials to discuss critical regional issues.

For ADHRB Weekly 285, click here.
See also Human Rights Watch here.
See also BIRD Weekly 220.

Look Who’s Talking: Sectarianism, between Iraq and Saudi Arabia

Contact: Christopher Denbow T:202-466-9500 Wednesday, 2 July 2014 Washington, DC – The Institute for Gulf Affairs released a comparative analysis on sectarianism and marginalization in Iraq and Saudi Arabia. This 20-page analysis takes into consideration the recent allegations of sectarianism and marginalization against the Iraqi government made by the Saudi Foreign Minister Saud AlFaisal, ironically, one of the most sectarian Saudi officials.

1.FINAL CALL FOR PAPERS | SYMPOSIA IRANICA FOURTH BIENNIAL PG AND EARLY CAREER SCHOLARS’ CONFERENCE ON IRANIAN STUDIES Hosted by the University of Cambridge at St John’s College, Cambridge, UK, 9-10 April 2019 ***Final Submissions by Midnight, Friday 25 January 2019*** We welcome proposals that engage with any aspect of

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Managing minefields: Saudi/UAE aid puts Pakistan-Iran relations on the spot

Pakistan is traversing minefields as it concludes agreements on investment, balance of payments support and delayed payment oil deliveries with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates worth USD$13 billion that are likely to fawn growing distrust in its relations with neighbouring Iran.

Saudi security operation kills two in Shi’ite town: TV

DUBAI (Reuters) – Two people were killed and others arrested in a “preemptive” security operation in Saudi Arabia’s eastern Qatif province, Saudi-owned Al Arabiya television said on Tuesday. Violence in the area has become more rare since security forces largely flushed out Shi’ite Muslim gunmen in a 2017 campaign that left much of the town’s old quarter flattened.

Indian Muslims: A rich hunting ground for Middle Eastern rivals

By James M. Dorsey

When President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently declared that Turkey was “the only country that can lead the Muslim world ” he probably wasn’t only thinking of Middle Eastern and other Islamic states such as Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Increasingly, there is evidence that Indian Muslims, the Islamic world’s fourth largest community after Indonesia and the South Asian states, is on Mr. Erdogan’s radar.

Mr. Erdogan’s interest in Indian Muslims highlights the flip side of a shared Turkish and Indian experience: the rise of religious parties and leaders with a tendency towards authoritarianism in non-Western democracies that, according to Turkey and India scholar Sumantra Bose, calls into question their commitment to secularism.

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1.International Conference: “Untangling Popular Power: Rhetoric, Faith, and Social Order in the Middle East,” Institute for Religion, Culture, and Public Life and Columbia Global Center Amman, Jordan, 2-3 March 2019 This forum aims to explore the extent to which recently emerging populisms in the contemporary Middle East are illustrative of

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Iranian-Islamic Illumination Course: Islīmī Patterns

Anahita Alavi Date: 14 January 2019 Time: 6:30 PM Finishes: 18 March 2019 Time: 8:30 PM Venue: MBI Al Jaber Building, 21 Russell Square Room: MBI Al Jaber Seminar Room Type of Event: Workshop Please note that the course will commence on 14 January 2019 and not 7 January 2019 as previously advertised and that it will run until 18 March 2019 instead of 11 March 2019.

BAHRAIN: Unfair Conviction of Leading Rights Defender Nabeel Rajab Upheld

31 December 2018 – Today, Bahrain’s Court of Cassation upheld the five-year sentence issued against leading human rights defender, Nabeel Rajab, for his critical comments on social media. Rajab has now exhausted all legal remedies. The Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (BIRD) condemns today’s decision in the strongest term and urges the Bahraini authorities…

For BIRD Weekly 218 click here.
See also Amnesty International.
See also ADHRB Weekly 283.

Christmas in Lebanon: ‘Jesus Isn’t Only for the Christians’

Lebanon Dispatch BEIRUT – The Iranian cultural attaché stepped up to the microphone on a stage flanked by banners bearing the faces of Iran’s two foremost religious authorities: Ayatollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic, and Ayatollah Khamenei, the current supreme leader.