On 9 December 2024, the Eighth Bahrain-EU Human Rights Dialogue meeting was held in Manama, established by the two sides with the aim of strengthening cooperation as well as supporting the process initiated by the Kingdom of Bahrain with the adoption of its National Human Rights Plan 2022-2026.

While, in 2023, the central theme of the bilateral meeting was the protection of women’s rights, this year the Parties paid special attention to trafficking in persons and the situation in prisons. This issue, and in particular the death penalty in Bahrain and Kuwait, had already been given attention in 2017 by the European Parliament, which in its resolution C-252/192, among other things, called for the establishment of a Permanent Dialogue, which has since arrived and is still operational.

The meeting — attended, for Bahrain, by the Director-General of Legal Affairs and Human Rights at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and, for the EU, by the Head of the Arabian Peninsula and Iraq Division at the European External Action Service — represents the latest in a series of initiatives aimed at implementing cooperation between the EU and its Member States and the Gulf’s Kingdom. And it was King Hamad Bin Isa Al Khalifa himself who, in a 12 September 2024, meeting with the President of the European Council, reiterated the importance of strengthening collaboration even within the framework of diplomatic initiatives between the EU and the Gulf Cooperation Council.

The relevance of similar initiatives, seemingly only institutional in scope, can be found in the way the EU acts, which traditionally links human rights (and environmental standards) to trade cooperation. Indeed, it is precisely trade that constitutes a bridge between the two Parties. For Bahrain, the EU is the second largest trading partner, right after Saudi Arabia, and for the EU, Bahrain is the 71st largest market for its goods. In addition to economic partnership, which also includes cooperation in the energy sector, for the past few years the Erasmus+ Program has also been opened to some Gulf countries, including Bahrain. In this sense, fostering exchanges of teachers and students has further tightened the bond between the two sides, which are increasingly connected also on the cultural and values level, and the continuation over the years of the Human Rights Dialogue proves this.

It seems clear that this bilateral cooperation is bound to be implemented more and more in the coming years, not only because of the common geopolitical challenges arising from the situation in the Gulf Region. In this direction, as reflected in the Bahrain Economic Vision 2030, diversification of the economy is among the country’s main goals, and in this the EU and its single market will be a useful ally. With climate change imposing new economic models and diversification of production processes, cooperation on an equal footing, also focused on a rapprochement on human rights, within the broader framework of EU-GCC partnership, will surely benefit both sides.