A Bahraini criminal court convicted 51 people and sentenced them to serve time in prison on charges of founding and joining a militant group and committing crimes in the kingdom.
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The High Criminal Court sentenced them to terms ranging between five years and life in prison, the official BNA news agency reported on Tuesday.
Investigations revealed that the defendants, including 27 abroad, had received financial support and funding from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the report said.
The defendants who are in Bahrain were arrested late last year.
They were also supplied with weapons and explosives and received military training in the camps of the Revolutionary Guards and the Iraqi Hezbollah movement to commit terrorist operations in the Kingdom, it added.
They plotted to target economic and vital installations, security patrol sites and the headquarters of the Ministry of Interior and Bahrain Defence Force.
Some of them targeted vehicles belonging to a transportation company with the intention of setting them on fire and some others carried out an operation targeting a bank ATM in November 2019.
Home to the U.S Navy’s 5th Fleet, Bahrain saw in 2011 mass protests led by the country’s majority Shiites, demanding wider reforms from the ruling Sunni family.
The protests, inspired by the Arab Spring revolts, were quelled with the help of regional Sunni powers, including Saudi Arabia.