Story highlights
Bahraini elected to U.N. human rights advisory committee
The move comes amid continued protests in country
The 17-year-old teen dies same day
A Bahraini man won a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council Advisory Committee the same day a young protester in the country was killed, officials and a human rights group said Saturday.
King Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa expressed support for Said Al-Faihani on his unanimous election Friday as the Asian group representative, Bahrain’s Information Affairs Authority said.
The nomination “represents the international community’s confidence in Bahrain’s progress in the human rights’ field,” the authority said in a statement.
A 17-year-old protester died Friday in clashes with security forces in the village of Sadad.
The interior ministry said a mob armed with Molotov cocktails and iron rods attacked a police patrol, prompting officers to defend themselves. The attacker was killed, the ministry said.
The Bahrain Center for Human Rights decried the incident as an example of “summary executions.”
In a statement, the center said that Ali Neamah was taking part in a peaceful protest, and that he was killed by a “deadly shot of a shotgun by the riot police from a close range.” It posted photographs of wounds to Neamah’s back.
Bahraini activists posted online photographs and videos of the clashes on Friday and Saturday. In them, protesters chanted “Down with Hamad,” referring to the king, while police shoot tear gas canisters.
CNN cannot verify the authenticity of the images.
Demonstrations in Bahrain failed to gain the traction of other Arab Spring uprisings after a crackdown by authorities in the island state, backed by troops from nearby Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Last November, Bahrain’s Independent Commission of Inquiry issued a report critical of authorities’ reactions to the protests, which began in February 2011, spurred by uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt.
