MANAMA: A young mother has been gunned down in the street as her six-year-old son watched from inside their car in Bahrain.
Eman Salehi, a 28-year-old Shiite woman, worked as a sports journalist for Bahrain’s state-run television broadcaster.
She was known for her piercing blue eyes and friendly demeanor. It’s unclear what sparked the December 23 shooting.
That night, her car was stopped in the Bahraini city of Riffa, a community popular with members of the ruling Al Khalifa family and the military.
A man shot Salehi once in the head, then immediately turned himself into authorities.
The murder shocked the small island and has sparked controversy over who carried out the killing.
Activists abroad allege a member of Bahrain’s Sunni royal family serving in the military pulled the trigger.
Bahrain’s monarchy has a long love of Britain’s own royal family and in November Prince Charles and his wife Camilla visited the country, which is repeatedly accused of human rights abuses.
The prince’s Clarence House issued a statement at the time saying ‘their royal highnesses are aware of the points raised by human rights organizations and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office are providing background briefings and information.’
A report by the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) organisation this year revealed British arms sales to Bahrain have increased significantly over the past five years.
Between February 2011 and September 2015, the UK has done deals with Bahrain worth £45 million, covering arms such as machine guns, assault rifles and anti-armour ammunition, the organisation said.
The total for the three years prior to the country’s 2011 Arab Spring protests was just £6 million.
The accusation that a member of Bahrain’s Sunni royal family serving in the military is Ms Salehi’s killer goes to the heart of lingering unrest on the island off the coast of Saudi Arabia, now five years on from its protests and in the grips of a renewed government crackdown on dissent.
‘If you say it involves the military, it involves the king,’ said Said Yousif Almuhafdah of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights. ‘No one wants to mention that.’
Bahrain’s Interior Ministry issued only a terse statement on Twitter saying there had been a ‘murder of a female.’
