| Ayat Al-Qurmezi | |
|---|---|
Ayat Al-Qurmezi on the front page of The Independent newspaper, June 2, 2011 |
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| Born | Ayat Hassan Mohammed Al-Qurmezi (aka Ayat Hassan Mohammed Al-Gormezi) c. 1991 Bahrain |
| Residence | Sadad, Kingdom of Bahrain |
| Occupation | Bahrani poet, activist, and student |
| Religion | Shia Islam |
| Website | |
| ayat-algormezi.blogspot.com | |
Ayat Hassan Mohammed Al-Qurmezi[1] (Arabic: آيات حسن محمد القرمزي) (born c. 1991, Sadad, Bahrain) is a poet and student at the Faculty of Teachers in Bahrain.[2]
The Bahrain Aid Flotilla is being launched in her honor.[3][4][5] The Ayat Al-Qurmezi was intercepted by the Bahraini navy.[6]
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On Wednesday, February 23, 2011, during the first days of the 2011 Bahraini uprising when protesters were camping in Pearl roundabout, Ayat rose to the podium in Pearl Roundabout and delivered her poem that was critical of the government policies and the policies of the current prime minister of Bahrain in specific. The student quickly rose to fame through the media channels of Youtube, Twitter and through BlackBerry Messenger as her poem was spread throughout Bahrain and the rest of the world. Since then, Ayat has been exposed to several forms of harassment and death threats that included herself and her family. Her personal information has been published through emails and Blackberry messages.[7] She has reportedly received numerous phone calls threatening her life and safety.[7]
On March 6, she read another poem which criticized the king. One verse, addressed to King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, included the lines: "We are the people who will kill humiliation and assassinate misery. Don't you hear their cries? Don't you hear their screams?"[8] Another verse imagines a dialogue with the Devil and King Hamad Bin Khalifa, wherein even the Devil, Hamad's best and “most courageous pupil”, says: “Hamad, your people have shaken me. Don't you hear their cries?”[9]
| External videos | |
|---|---|
| Ayat reading her second poem in Pearl roundabout on March 6, 2011 on YouTube | |
On March 29, 2011, in the morning, riot police stormed the Al-Qurmezi house with the assistance of the female police force to detain Ayat. At the time, she was not home and the police began ransacking her home. They reportedly threatened Ayat's mother by saying “we will arrest Ayat, even if she is hidden in the depths of the earth”.[7][10]
She was arrested the next day, on March 30, 2011, for reciting a poem critical of the government and cursing the current prime minister Khalifa ibn Salman Al Khalifa during the pro-democracy protests in Pearl Square, the main gathering place for demonstrators, in February. She was forced to give herself up after police raided her parents' house and made four of Ayat's brothers lie on the floor at gunpoint. She was not there at the time. One policeman shouted at their father "If you do not tell us where Ayat is in fifteen minutes, we will kill each of your sons in front of your eyes – I have orders to do so".[2][7][8][10][11][12][13][14][15] After this ordeal, her mother and father had no choice but to ask Ayat to return home.[7]
She was taken away in a car with two security officials – a man and a woman – both of whom were masked and dressed in civilian clothes. They immediately started to beat her and threaten her, saying she would be raped and sexually assaulted with degrading photographs of her put on the internet.[15] Her family say the days after Ayat was taken away was a period of intense psychological torture. "We knew nothing about what had happened to her though we heard rumours that she had been raped or killed," her brother Yousif Mohammed said. The riot forces and the police, faces covered, told the mother that they would take her to be interrogated and sign documents. They were told that they would then be able to take her home from Al-Howra police station.[7] Her mother went from police station to police station asking for news of Ayat, but learned nothing. Sa'ada was finally told by the police that she should file a missing persons report, though she complained that this was absurd since it was the police who had detained her daughter.[15]
And in a sinister development, pictures of Ayat began to turn up on dating and pornographic websites. This may relate to the threats made by police when she was first arrested that shameful photographs of her would be posted online.[11][15] Ayat's mother did speak to her once on the phone when Ayat told her that she had been forced to sign a false confession. Her mother has been told confidentially that Ayat is in a military hospital as a result of injuries inflicted when she was tortured.[2][11]
On several occasions she was taken to the interrogation centre where she had first been held and a video was taken of her giving her name and saying that she was a Shia and she hated Sunnis.[15] Her mother said her daughter was expelled from university, apparently caught up in government-ordered purges of thousands of students, workers and others accused of backing the protests.[12]
In a statement, the main Shia political group, Al-Wefaq, whose 18 lawmakers resigned to protest the harsh measures against protesters, said the poet's arrest is a "clear message that the government is against freedom of expression."[12]
Amnesty International has spoken out against Bahraini brutality and called for Ayat's release:
| “ | "By locking up a female poet merely for expressing her views in public, Bahrain's authorities are demonstrating how free speech and assembly are brutally denied to ordinary Bahrainis,"[10] | ” |
said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International's Director for the Middle East and North Africa."[12][14]
"Ayat al-Qarmezi has been put on trial merely for expressing her opinion, peacefully and openly. Her case represents an appalling and sinister attack on free speech. The charges against her should be dropped and she should be released immediately," he added.[13] The United Nations called for "an immediate cessation of trials of civilians in the court of national safety and an immediate release of peaceful demonstrators who were arrested in the context of the protest movement in February."[14]
English PEN has called for her immediate and unconditional release and reminded the Bahraini authorities of their obligations to protect the right to freedom of expression as guaranteed by Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Bahrain is an official state party.[16] Many of her supporters have spoken out, through petitions, blogs and social media, calling for the release of the "Freedom Poet"[14]
| External videos | |
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| Bahrain T.V. showing Ayat's forced apology to king and prime minister on June 21, 2011 on YouTube | |
During her detention she was whipped across the face with electric cable, held for nine days in a tiny cell with the temperature near freezing, and was forced to clean lavatories with her bare hands.[10][11][12][13][15][17] At times, Ayat thought the air conditioning in the cell was emitting some form of gas, which made her feel she was suffocating. Throughout this period the police made no real attempt to interrogate her.[15] Some reports say that Ayat was also threatened with rape.[14] On June 21, she made a televised apology to the king and the prime minister.[14]
She was charged with "incitement to hatred of the regime", "insulting members of the royal family" and "illegal assembly".[10][12][15]
On June 12, 2011, She was sentenced to one year in prison by a security court. without any legal argument or her lawyer being allowed to speak, said a family member present at the trial. Her brother, Yousif Mohammed, said by phone from Bahrain that her treatment in prison had improved in recent days, in contrast to the extreme mistreatment she received when she was first detained at the end of March.[8][11][17]
The court's decision drew sharp denunciations from opposition groups and the human rights group Amnesty International, which said the verdict highlighted how free speech is "brutally denied" by Bahrain's authorities.[12]
On July 13, she was released and hundreds gathered nearby her house in Sadad to welcome her nearby her.[8][18][19] However, her sentence has not been revoked.[11][20] Her family fear that she might be re-arrested, as she has not been pardoned and her release was not the result of an appeal against her one-year sentence.[11] She is currently under house arrest.[21]