Prosecutors in Bahrain file charges over the death of a man detained by domestic spy agency

Prosecutors in Bahrain said Thursday they had filed criminal charges over the death in custody of a man who was detained by the country’s National Intelligence Agency.

The criminal case against an unnamed member of the domestic spy service came weeks after Bahrain’s Interior Ministry announced an investigation into the death of Mohamed al-Mousawi, whose body was returned to his family bearing bruises, burns and cuts on March 27.

The Associated Press spoke to five witnesses who saw al-Mousawi at the morgue or at his funeral the following day and had a forensic expert from Physicians for Human Rights review images of his body. Witness described marks showing beating, whipping by cables and electrocution burns. The New York-based organization concluded the injuries matched descriptions of blunt force trauma and torture.

Al-Mousawi was among dozens detained or charged as the Iran war raged. His family told AP he disappeared on March 19 after attending prayers with two friends, who remain in detention. He was later confirmed by authorities to have been arrested on suspicion of spying for Iran, allegations his family denied.

Human Rights Watch and the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy demanded an investigation. When the Interior Ministry announced it, it said the images of al-Mousawi from the military hospital morgue were “inaccurate and misleading.”

Bahrain’s Public Prosecution Office on Thursday described the charges as “assault resulting in death.” It said investigators reviewed medical records, videos and spoke to witnesses who saw the body. It did not allege torture or provide details about the individual charged but said they admitted to the crimes they were accused of and taken into custody. It said the arrest was lawful.

Bahrain restored arrest powers to its domestic spy service in 2017, reversing earlier restrictions imposed over earlier abuse allegations as Bahrain deepened a long-running campaign to suppress dissent.

Rights groups say Bahrain — a Sunni-ruled monarchy whose population, like Iran’s, is majority Shiite — used the war as a pretext to crack down on critics. The island kingdom, which hosts the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet, was pummeled by Iranian airstrikes for weeks before the ceasefire took hold. Authorities arrested veteran Shiite activists, migrant workers who filmed strikes and demonstrators who mourned the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, or protested the U.S. military’s presence.

Though the individual charged was not identified by his role in Bahrain’s National Intelligence Agency, the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy said in a statement that it believed he was likely a security official, due to the mandate of the investigative unit tasked with looking into al-Mousawi’s death.

It demanded authorities share their findings with his family and noted the two men who disappeared with him in March had only been able to contact their families twice and hadn’t been able to disclose their place of detention.