Tabriz,South Azerbaijan, Mar 4
Bahraini security forces informed on Saturday that they had arrested 116 people accused of belonging to a “terror” cell allegedly linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards,Times of Israeli reported.
An official statement on state news agency BNA said that security services had in the process thwarted a number of attacks and seized large quantities of arms and explosives.
Authorities in the tiny Gulf state have cracked down hard on dissent since mass street protests in 2011, which demanded an elected prime minister and constitutional monarchy in the Sunni-ruled, Shiite majority kingdom.
Bahrain frequently accuses opposition figures of links to Shiite Iran, which denies supporting any bid to overthrow the government.
The statement charged that the cell planned to target leading security figures and carry out attacks on oil and other vital installations.
It accused those detained of being members of a cell formed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and said that as many as 48 of those detained had received military training in Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon.
They received training on the use of explosives, light arms, artillery, and rocket-propelled grenades, according to the statement.
It should be noted that on November 2017 , Bahrain accused Iran of training and arming two men accused of bombing a Saudi Aramco oil pipeline outside the capital Manama — an allegation Tehran dismissed as “false.”
Although Ayatollah Khamenei said about two years ago: “The people of Bahrain are oppressed and we support the oppressed, whatever we can.”
