Bahraini court sentences teenage boy to 130 years in prison

Ahmad al-Arab will be 147 years old after serving his jail term handed down by a Bahraini court.

The High Criminal Court in the capital Manama on Tuesday sentenced the 17-year-old to an additional 10 years in prison on charges of protesting against the ruling Al Khalifah royal family and charges of alleged terror acts, Arabic-language Manama Post online newspaper reported.

The court also ruled that Arab, who was arrested on April 13 last year, will no longer be a Bahraini national at the end of his prison term.

The Tuesday ruling is the latest in a series of harsh punishments handed down to dissidents in Bahrain, a tiny Persian Gulf island nation that has seen years of anti-regime protests.

Meanwhile, anti-government protesters staged a fresh pro-democracy rally in the northern village of Abu Saiba and called on the Bahraini regime to heed calls by the United Nations and human rights organizations to resolve the political crisis in the country and release all political prisoners.

Anti-regime protesters have been holding demonstrations on the streets of Bahrain since mid-February 2011, calling for the Al Khalifah family to relinquish power. The regime's ongoing heavy-handed crackdown on peaceful demonstrations has left scores of people dead and hundreds injured, and many more incarcerated.

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