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Bahrain - UK Relations

The UK's longstanding bilateral relationship with Bahrain is in excellent health. The UK continues to support the political and economic reform agendas and to develop co-operation in other areas, particularly through the FCO Global Opportunities Fund (GOF). British advisers, including serving UK police officers, work in several Ministries. The UK Home Office signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Ministry of Interior on 20 October 2005 aimed at promoting co-operation on a number of issues, including Counter Terrorism and Civil Policing. A bilateral Economic Memorandum of Understanding was signed on 6 September 2006. Relations between the House of Windsor and the Al Khalifa are exceptionally warm, even by regional standards.

Bahrain has traditionally had one of the best educational systems in the region. Educational reform is a key element of the wider economic reform programme and Bahrain has for some time been seeking to become the prime training centre in the region. It is also a key area of bilateral co-operation, for example in the field of Citizenship Education, and our support for the introduction of national standards for vocational qualifications based on the NVQ system. A large and growing number of Bahrainis study at UK universities at both undergraduate and graduate level.

The UK’s package of technical assistance to support reform in Bahrain began in 2012. Much of it has focused on building effective and accountable institutions, strengthening the rule of law and police and justice reform, in line with the recommendations in the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry (BICI) and UN Universal Periodic Review (UPR). This co-operation continued in 2016.

Beneficiaries of the UK’s support include independent human rights and oversight institutions such as the National Institution of Human Rights (NIHR), Ministry of Interior Ombudsman, Prisoners’ and Detainees’ Rights Commission (PDRC) and Special Investigations Unit (SIU), who provide independent oversight of police behaviour and detention standards, and were established as a result of BICI recommendations. Whilst allegations of ill-treatment in detention continue, confidence in these organisations is increasing, and they are working more effectively. The NIHR’s 2014 Annual Report, published in December 2015, states that it registered 88 complaints. Of these, 36 were upheld.

On 10 November 2016 the UK officially opened a massive naval base in Bahrain, the first time in four decades that London was opening such a facility in the Persian Gulf region. Britain's Prince Charles inaugurated the Naval Support Facility (NSF) in the Bahraini capital of Manama on Thursday, marking the 200th anniversary of mutual relations with the Arab kingdom. London plans to make the NSF its second busiest center of operations for the Royal Navy after Portsmouth, allowing its warships to resupply and undergo repair in the region without having to return to the UK.

The NSF will host around 600 military forces and warships tasked with patrolling the surrounding waters. The UK's Royal Air Force (RAF), which has been using Bahraini air bases for over 90 years, is the UK military's other element of presence in the region. In his visit to London last month, Bahrain's monarch King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifah called for closer ties between the two kingdoms as he met with Queen Elizabeth, Prime Minister Theresa May and other British officials. He also invited May to the upcoming (Persian) Gulf Cooperation Council summit, which would be held in Manama.

The UK's willingness to expand ties with Bahrain comes at a time when the repressive regime is under international pressure to end its years-long crackdown on a popular uprising. Since 2011, the year that saw the eruption of peaceful anti-regime protests in Bahrain, the UK has sold 55 million dollars worth of arms to the Al Khalifah regime. Scores of people have been killed and hundreds of others injured or arrested in the Bahraini crackdown on the anti-regime activists, who have been holding protests on an almost daily basis since February 14, 2011. The UK has also provided training and intelligence to Bahraini security forces, who have been aided by their Saudi counterparts in their violent crackdown.