Saturday, February 11, 2012

2 American women arrested during protest in Bahrain




CNN

Left: Huwaida Arraf in Gaza aboard the Free Gaza boat.

"(CNN) -- Two American women were arrested during a demonstration Saturday in the capital of Bahrain, with state news and one of the women's husbands offering divergent accounts as to whether they were then deported.

Huwaida Arraf and Radhika Sainath arrived in Bahrain several days ago and obtained tourist visas, reported the state-run Bahrain News Agency .

They were arrested Saturday afternoon by authorities in Manama, the news agency and the advocacy group Witness Bahrain both said.

Adam Shapiro, Arraf's husband, told CNN late Saturday from Ireland that the two have been charged with being at an illegal gathering -- because the protest they were at was not considered legal -- as well as giving false reasons for entering the county. He based his account on talks with U.S. embassy officials, though he hadn't talked with his wife directly.

He denied that the women had been deported back to the United States, as the Bahrain News Agency reported.

Rather, Shapiro said the women spent part of what was early Sunday morning at a Bahraini court hearing attended by a prosecutor, their lawyers, a judge and two U.S. embassy officials.

U.S. State Department spokesman Harry Edwards confirmed the American embassy was aware and engaged in the case, noting that consular officials had visited the pair......."

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