Lawyers seek more time to study IS link case

Defence lawyers yesterday requested for more time to study the 900-page case of 24 defendants suspected of having links with the Islamic State (IS). Only two of the defendants yesterday appeared before the High Criminal Court, with one of them making his first appearance. 

He entered a not guilty plea. However, 16 of the suspects are still at large and they are being tried in absentia. Aged between 16 and 42, the suspects have been charged on October 24 last year with forming a cell of the IS group, plotting suicide attacks and recruiting fighters for the jihadist organisation.  Among the suspects is IS ideological lodestar Turki Al Binali and three of his brothers. 

Three lawyers attended the courtroom, amongst them were Abdullah Hashish, who is representing five suspects and Manar Al Tamimi, who is defending one of the defendants. 

Lawyer Hashim requested for more time to study the case, while Al Tamimi explained that the case was documented in 900 pages that were burned on a CD. 

She has also requested for more time to review the case. The defendants are said to have been plotting to carry out a suicide bombing in a local mosque. The mastermind of the cell was Turki, who is believed to have recruited dozens of Bahraini youth and sent them to frontlines outside the country. 

The third, tenth, fifteenth and twenty-first defendants are said to have been also recruited to fight with the terrorist group by 31-year-old Turki. The second defendant (one of Turki’s brothers) reportedly travelled to Syria where he received military training and took part in hostilities before returning to the Kingdom of Bahrain. 

He along with the third defendant, were assigned later by their brother Turki to encourage more young Bahrainis to join IS and facilitate their travel to Syria to receive militia training and fight with IS members.  

The fourteenth defendant is said to have requested the fifth defendant to carry out a terrorist attack against Shias in Bahrain because there wasn’t sufficient money to help him travel to Syria. 

They reportedly targeted the A’ali Grand Mosque in a bid to kill a high number of Shia worshipers. Turki has been charged with establishing a branch for a terrorist organisation intended to disable the provisions of the Constitution and prevent State institutions and public authorities from exercising its business by terror means. 

The other defendants have been indicted with joining a terrorist organisation, receiving militia training, using arms, possessing weapons and explosives, participating in terrorist operations and planning to carry out terrorist attacks in Bahrain. 

Bahrain has announced on October 21 charging 24 people with forming a cell of IS, plotting suicide attacks and recruiting fighters for the jihadist organisation. The move came after investigations into the formation of a “branch for a terrorist group... the so-called Daesh,” said a prosecution statement, using the Arabic acronym for IS.

Their trial was adjourned yesterday until February 2. It’s worth to note that 11 of the defendants had earlier their Bahraini nationality stripped of by the State due to their terrorist activities.