DUBAI: A 20-year-old female Bahraini poet has been charged with incitement and insulting members of the al-Khalifa royal family in the small island nation. Over two months ago, Ayat al-Ghermazi read aloud a poem she had written to anti-government protesters in the capital, Manama. She was then arrested shortly thereafter and has been in custody for two months. Bahraini human rights activists say that although Ghermezi has not been raped, she has been subjected to what they say is torture while in custody. Her alleged crime centers on a poem she read to the protesters at the Pearl Roundabout in Manama, the focal point of the street movement, until it was destroyed by the government. Its lyrics include the lines: “We are the people who will kill humiliation and assassinate misery/We are the people who will destroy the foundation of injustice/Don't you hear their cries, don't you hear their screams?” She said the poem was addressed to King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and his prime minister and relative Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa. Women's activists in the country have condemned the government, saying that Ghermazi deserves to be free for expressing her voice. BM
