the base was “reward” for Britain’s silence over on-going human rights violations in Bahrain

"The Royal Navy base was first announced in December last year, amid allegations the base was “reward” for Britain’s silence over on-going human rights violations in the Gulf state." "The report, which was released earlier this year, documented dozens of cases of detainees being beaten, deprived of sleep and adequate food, burned with cigarettes, sexually assaulted and subjected to electric shocks. “All the British government's policies show is a commitment to military expansion at the cost of human rights,” said Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei, director of Advocacy at the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy. “Bahrain continues to systemically arbitrarily arrest, torture and silence any critic of the government. This new base is totally inappropriate.” Campaigners are also dismayed that the Royal Navy has chosen to name HMS Juffair after a 1930s colonial base in the country, amid suggestions that the UK is “celebrating a legacy of repression”."