World gets distorted information about Bahrain: Professor

Press TV has conducted an interview with Daoud Khairallah, a professor of law at the Georgetown University from Washington, about a court in Bahrain sentencing seven anti-regime protesters to 15 years in prison as pressure on dissent mounts in the country. What follows is an approximate transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Even though the sentences are different in severity, there are many who are comparing the judicial process that took place in Bahrain with that in Egypt where we saw 500 people get sentenced to death for the death of one security guard. Do you see it that way too?

Khairallah: Well each country is in a sense sovereign and it depends on how its people, the culture of the rule of law. One would hope that the judiciaries in Egypt and in Bahrain are maintaining high legal standards and all necessary protections for the defendants to prove their innocence or their guilt.

Press TV: So what do you make of these recent sentences that have been handed down? There are those who are saying that these are extremely harsh and more sentences do take place in a biased way?

Khairallah: Well this is why I say that the standards that are applied by the judiciary in each court, in each society are a reflection of the level of development and awareness of the society, of the importance of the rule of law, because whenever politics interferes in the legal process, the first victim is justice and societies pay a high price for neglecting or for disregarding high levels, high standards of justice.

Press TV: Okay then let me rephrase my question Professor Khairallah. Do you think that politics is interfering in the judicial process in Bahrain?

Khairallah: Well ostensibly this is the case and it is to the credit of the Bahraini people. The uprising in Bahrain has been peaceful, they have not resorted to arms although they are the majority of the people and the countries who supported the government are the same countries that are arming people in Syria and other places to resort to violence. It is to the credit of the Bahraini people, those who had uprising and who want a reform and probably the whole world should witness and those who are responsible for the uprising, they should make sure that their case, their just cause, and their behavior is well-known and well-seen by the international community and the rest of the world.

Press TV: Now the Al Khalifa regime is doing its utmost to portray a sense of normalcy at least in international media. This is while protest and repression of these protesters continues. How do you see the situation evolving from here onward?

Khairallah: Well what one fears, if there is a distortion of facts and misuse of the instrument of justice, the course, the judiciary, whatever and this would lead people to resorting to violence because they fear that going through the normal courses, justice is not being done and on the contrary there is a certain distortion, deliberate distortion of facts and this would not last too long with people, people would start resisting and resorting to different means and take what they consider is their right into their own hands and that would be very unfortunate.

Press TV: And very quickly if you can Professor Khairallah, do you think that the international community has abandoned the Bahraini people in these times?

Khairallah: Well unfortunately the international community is fed information by a media that is already politicized and distorted. The international community, the ordinary man anywhere in the world, would take a position, will decide based on the facts that he or she would see. When they see distorted facts, they would react accordingly.

And unfortunately we know that the media is biased, the media is controlled by special interest and there is a huge double standard in the way the world sees what is going on in the entire Arab world and this is very unfortunate.