"Bahraini police detaining, beating & threatening to rape school girls ..."

"... Details of the terrible bloodbath in the Arab kingdom are related by Patrick Cockburn in an article headlined Anti-Shia pogroms sweep Bahrain. He points out that the Al-Jazeera TV news network, which is based in neighbouring Qatar, was initially "reticent about events in Bahrain." But it did reveal this week that the Bahraini police have been raiding girls' schools. They have detained and beaten the girls and have been accused of threatening to rape them. Cockburn's report is disturbing to read because the repression involves killings, arrests, incidents of torture, destruction of buildings and the firing of people from key jobs (such as the health service). He writes: "Facing little criticism from the US, otherwise so concerned about human rights abuses in Libya, the al-Khalifa family is ruthlessly crushing opposition at every level." Indeed, the western media has not concentrated as much attention on Bahrain as it has on Libya and even Syria."