Shia protests after Bahrain executions

Security officials in Bahrain announced earlier on Monday that a municipal building was set on fire as fresh protests by Shia citizens erupted over the executions of three Shia men convicted of killing an Emirati police officer and two Bahraini policemen in a 2014 bomb attack.

The building was torched overnight in the Aali area, south of the capital Manama, the interior ministry said in a statement. The ministry did not link the arson explicitly to the execution of the three men, but did say that the fire was deliberate.

The Shia Hezbollah movement has also condemned the executions, according to a report in Lebanon’s Daily Star. “Many international organisations consider what happened to be extrajudicial killing,” claimed the group’s spokesperson. “This execution will topple any opportunity to reach a political solution to the crisis in Bahrain.”

The executions are the first to have been carried out by the Manama government since the start of the Arab Spring in 2011.

Civil defence extinguished a fire in Northern Municipality building. Initial details indicate that foul play was behind the fire

— Ministry of Interior (@moi_bahrain) January 16, 2017