The State of Peaceful Assembly in Bahrain During the Third Quarter of 2025

During the Third Quarter of 2025 (July – August – September)

The right to peaceful assembly is guaranteed under the Constitution of the Kingdom of Bahrain and the international covenants ratified by Bahrain, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. It is also guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which Bahrain has adopted and ratified. Despite these guarantees, individuals engaging in peaceful assembly are subjected to institutional and systematic violations and abuses by authorities. For three decades, Bahraini citizens have paid a heavy price for engaging in peaceful assembly, facing security suppression, arrest, and torture. Still, they continue to exercise and uphold their inalienable rights. 2025 witnessed a noticeable increase in the number of peaceful assemblies. Violations related to these assemblies also escalated, with the number of arrests linked to peaceful assemblies rising. This includes the targeting of children through summons, detention, ill-treatment, and prosecution.

Accordingly, the Bahraini government continues to violate Article (15) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which protects the child’s right to freedom of peaceful assembly, as well as paragraph “b” of Article (37), which states:

The continuation of patterns of summons and detention against minors, some of whom are not older than fifteen, aims to restrict freedom of expression and suppress civic activism, in blatant violation of international standards concerning children’s rights.

The report provides detailed documentation of peaceful assemblies, in addition to cases of summons, arrests, and violations related to freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly in Bahrain during the period from July to September 2025. It relies on documentation from Bahrain by the Monitoring and Follow-up Team at Salam for Democracy and Human Rights (SALAM DHR), testimonies from families of victims or prisoners, as well as a review of official, Bahraini, regional, and international human rights data and reports.

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