MANAMA: Three NGOs said Bahrain must halt human rights violations and a crackdown on hospitals where doctors and patients suspected of links to protests were being arrested.

London-based Amnesty International called on Bahrain’s Western partners to urge Manama to end arrests of medical staff and opposition activists. It accused Western governments of silence due to Bahrain’s strategic location as home of the U.S. Fifth Fleet and its importance as a Gulf trade partner. “North American and European governments, so vocal recently in espousing the cause of human rights in Libya, Tunisia and Egypt, need also to speak out about what is going on in Bahrain,” said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International’s director for the Mideast and North Africa.

Paris-based Medecins sans Frontieres (Doctors without Borders) said Friday Bahrain had turned hospitals into “places to be feared,” where both doctors and patients suspected of having a role in the protests were detained. “Wounds are used to identify demonstrators, restricted access to health care is being used to deter people from protesting, and those who dare to seek treatment in health facilities are being arrested,” the aid group said. “The police, military and intelligence services must stop using the health system as a way to crack down on the protesters.”

U.S.-based rights group Physicians for Human Rights said doctors were disappearing as part of systematic action. “The excessive use of force against unarmed civilians, patients in hospitals and medical personnel that PHR’s investigators documented is extremely troubling and is cause for an immediate international investigation,” the group said Friday.