By ETHAN BRONNER
Published: March 13, 2011
CAIRO — Thousands of antigovernment protesters in Bahrain blocked access to the financial district in Manama, the capital, on Sunday, preventing many workers from getting to their offices and pushing back the police who tried to disperse them. It was the most serious challenge to the royal family that rules Bahrain since protests began last month.
Witnesses said the police used tear gas and fired on the protesters with rubber bullets.
“This was a very, very big day,” Mohammad al-Maskati, president of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, said by telephone from Pearl Square, the epicenter for protests in central Manama. “Now the protesters control these streets. There are walls of rubble keeping out the police and armed groups. People say they will not sleep tonight.”
Published: March 13, 2011
CAIRO — Thousands of antigovernment protesters in Bahrain blocked access to the financial district in Manama, the capital, on Sunday, preventing many workers from getting to their offices and pushing back the police who tried to disperse them. It was the most serious challenge to the royal family that rules Bahrain since protests began last month.
Witnesses said the police used tear gas and fired on the protesters with rubber bullets.
“This was a very, very big day,” Mohammad al-Maskati, president of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, said by telephone from Pearl Square, the epicenter for protests in central Manama. “Now the protesters control these streets. There are walls of rubble keeping out the police and armed groups. People say they will not sleep tonight.”
There were also clashes at the campus of the main university, where protesters contended that the security forces were protecting armed vigilantes accused of fomenting tensions between the 70 percent of the population that is Shia and the Sunni ruling family and elite.
The latest protests occurred a day after Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates stopped in Bahrain and warned the Khalifa family, which has ruled Bahrain for two centuries, that it must go beyond the “baby steps” of reform to meet the economic and political demands sweeping much of the Arab world.
Bahrain, a tiny kingdom on the Persian Gulf, is home to the United States Navy’s Fifth Fleet and is a crucial American ally. The Obama administration has supported the Khalifa family through the period of unrest, unlike the policy it adopted in seeking to remove the leaders of Libya and, to a lesser extent, Egypt. But the White House has tried to push the Bahraini government to meet many of the protesters’ demands, worried that Iran, the capital of Shiite Islam, could exploit the unhappiness of the Shiites in Bahrain.
“I expressed the view that we had no evidence that suggested that Iran started any of these popular revolutions or demonstrations across the region,” Mr. Gates told reporters after his visit on Saturday. “But there is clear evidence that as the process is protracted, particularly in Bahrain, that the Iranians are looking for ways to exploit it and create problems.” He added, “Time is not our friend.”
The demonstrations on Sunday occurred on King Faisal Highway at the entrance to Manama’s financial district. In a statement, the government said the violence began when “a group of protesters attacked unarmed police officers, resulting in one police officer being stabbed and another sustaining a serious head injury.”
“Police then sought to disperse approximately 350 protesters by using tear gas in order to clear the road,” the government said. “The Ministry of Interior is currently undergoing operations to reopen the King Faisal Highway.”
By Sunday evening, witnesses said, the highway remained essentially closed to traffic and was in the hands of demonstrators.
“It is like a ghost town with the highway closed and the financial district closed,” Hussein Muhammad, a bookstore owner and activist, said by telephone. “Thousands of people came all morning, and hundreds were injured.” Two demonstrators suffered serious head injuries, witnesses said.
Last month, Obama administration officials said that Bahrain’s king, Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, listened when President Obama asked him to pull back his security forces after seven people were killed at the start of the protests.
The demonstrators have grown frustrated that they have been allowed to hold onto Pearl Square, which is a traffic circle, but have not achieved any of their political goals. That is why, they said, they chose to move on the financial center in a country that prizes its business-friendly policies. And there is growing concern that the pro-democracy movement is deteriorating into a Sunni-Shia split.
“We want a new constitution, fair and free elections and a government elected directly by the people,” Mohammad Mattar, an engineer and member of the Waad pro-reform movement, said by telephone. “These are not sectarian demands, but political ones. We want a constitutional monarchy, a clear relationship between the ruling family and society. But the security forces are trying to create a sectarian divide.”
Mr. Gates said on Saturday that he told the king and crown prince that change “could be led or it could be imposed.” He added, “Obviously, leading reform and being responsive is the way we’d like to see this move forward.”
Read in New York Times
