MANAMA, 17 March 2005 — The United Nations has asked Bahrain to prove its compliance with the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination which it had signed in 1990, as a key opposition figure who was fired from his job on Tuesday accused the government of fostering division on the basis of one’s sect.

Dr. Abdul Jalil Al-Sengase, who was the head of mechanical engineering department at the College of Engineering of the University of Bahrain, described his dismissal as politically motivated and in retaliation for his involvement in opposition campaigns and activities.

Al-Sengase made the comments in a speech during a ceremony to honor webmaster Ali Abdel Imam and two of his aides who were released on Monday after two weeks in jail.

The accusations come as the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) asked the Bahraini government for a detailed report on steps it had taken to eliminate discrimination, after it refuted the government claims presented during the Geneva meetings late last month and earlier this month that racial discrimination did not exist in Bahrain.

The CERD said that the Bahraini government did not provide specific data on the ethnic composition of the population — by race, descent, ethnicity, language and religion, as well as the socio-economic status of each group. Manama is required to provide the data, which the CERD said was vital to assess the extent of the implementation of the treaty, in its next report scheduled for April 2007.

The CERD move came as a blow to the high ranking delegation that was headed by former opposition figure and present Minister of Labor, Dr. Majeed Al-Alawi, whose comments sparked a wave of criticism inside Bahrain. It also comes as an embarrassment for the government since a shadow report presented by the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR) — which was dissolved in September by Al-Alawi when he was minister of labor and social affairs — prompted the CERD to make its recommendation.

Al-Sengase, who is No. 3 in the country’s largest opposition group Al-Wefaq Islamic Society, said he was warned by a senior Interior Ministry official that he would lose his job because of his political involvement.

The accusations of discrimination are not new, but it is the first time anyone claims that he had lost his job because of political activity since 1999 when King Hamad launched his reform program.

Al-Sengase, who continues to lecture at the university despite his dismissal, said he was consulting his lawyer to take legal action to overturn the decision.