Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy

Salah Abbas: Case Information

Map: Salah Abbas joined a protest on 20 April which began in Karranah (top). Police skirmished with protesters near the
Country Mall (middle). Salah Abbas and six other individuals attempted to flee the scene, and were chased by police. Salah
Abbas was separated from the other people, who were beaten by police. He was discovered the following morning, 21 April,
dead on the roof of a farm building in Shakhurah (bottom).

Salah Abbas, 36, was discovered dead in the morning of 21 April 2012, the day before the Bahrain
Grand Prix (20-22 April), on the roof of a farm building in Shakhura village. He was discovered by a
local worker, who called the police at 8.10 AM.
Salah Abbas’s body showed marks of shotgun wounds to the left flank and chest. Human rights
defender and Dr Taha Durazi ​examined Salah Abbas’s corpse​ prior to his funeral and described
friction burns and shotgun wounds on the corpse. He found what appeared to be bone fractures in
his neck and upper body, but was unable to confirm further. ​The Public Prosecution’s medical
examiner​ found that the cause of death was shotgun fire, and did not note burns or fractures.
A local of Shakhura secretly filmed the police as they dealt with Salah Abbas’s body. The video is
available here: ​https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxwaoP1-hxU​. At 1m42s, the man behind the
camera starts to shout at police: “I recorded you when you killed him last night! I recorded you as
you killed him last night, I captured the picture, I captured the picture.” The police start to fire at him
at 2m00s. The man continues to shout, “See, I’ve captured the picture, you don’t have to bring
charges or anything, you’ve been filmed and we’ll expose you, and the​ Formula​ will close! I captured
the picture and we’ll expose you!” Police shotgun fire is heard as he runs away. Despite the man’s
statements, no credible footage or photographs of Salah Abbas’s death are known to have ever been

 Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy
published.
Events leading up to Salah Abbas’s death
Salah Abbas’s brother ​told local press​ on 23 April that Mr. Abbas had joined a protest the night
before, on 20 April, organised by the political opposition in the nearby village of Karranah. He stated:
“My brother participated in a protest organised by the opposition last Friday in Karranah village, and
at the end of it there were security skirmishes. Eyewitnesses say that my brother and six others ran
in the direction of a farm in Abu Saiba village, and that the men he was with were beaten. My
brother tried to run away again, and shotgun fire was aimed at him, and news of him disappeared. In
the evening, we tried to ask about him and could not reach any information.”
The brother also ​said​ that the family received calls from Shakhura locals at approximately 9 AM,
nearly an hour after the body was first reported. The family went to the farm where his body was
discovered. There, “the security forces prevented us from examining his body, and fired sound
grenades and tear gas at us to disperse us. We later went to the Salmaniya Medical Complex
morgue, where they denied us to examine his body. Only my older brother was allowed in to see
only the face of the deceased, to identify him.”
Salah Abbas was ​buried​ in Bilad Al Qadim on 23 April.
Prosecution of a police officer
The Special Investigation Unit, a non-independent body ​complicit in the execution of torture victims
in 2017, investigated Salah Abbas’s death. Based on their investigation, a police officer was charged
with killing Salah Abbas and prosecuted. The police officer, a Pakistani national, was not named by
local press.
During the court proceedings, a police officer called as a witness ​said​ that some of the protesters
threw Molotov cocktails at the police, who responded with tear gas and shotgun fire. He said that
protesters gathered behind the Country Mall in Abu Saiba, and police were ordered to chase them.
The same witness further said, after being ordered to chase protesters gathered behind Country
Mall, the officer accused of killing Salah Abbas ​stated​ that he had dealt with them using his shotgun.
In November 2013, the First High Criminal Court ​acquitted​ the police officer of charges of killing
Salah Abbas, having found too many contradictions in the case. No other police officers were
investigated or prosecuted.