MANAMA, Bahrain—Officials here on Saturday accused Iran of training and supplying people who sought to carry out terror attacks and create political turmoil on the tiny Gulf island.
Bahrain Chief of Public Security Tariq Al Hasan said the country’s police and intelligence services have disrupted a number of attacks by intercepting smuggled vessels with weapons from Iran and discovering concealed facilities to make improvised explosive devices, also with material supplied by Iran. Speaking to reporters, Mr. Al Hasan said a list of targets included police and military bases, as well as officials, but the Bahrain police official didn’t provide details.
Earlier Saturday, Bahrain Minister of Foreign Affairs Shaikh Khalid bin Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Khalifa also accused Iran of attempting to destabilize the country by training and supporting its Bahrain citizens to carry out attacks.
“Daesh isn’t the only terrorist threat,” Bahrain’s foreign minister told a regional security conference, referring to another name for Islamic State.
The allegations made during a security conference, called the Manama Dialogue, reflected festering tensions between Iran and Gulf countries.
In early October, Bahrain recalled its ambassador from Iran and expelled Iran’s charge d’affairs, saying Iran supported “sabotage, terrorism and instigation to violence” in the Gulf island.
While Iran advocates for a greater political standing for Bahrain’s Shiite majority, it has rejected allegations that it meddles in the country’s affairs—or ships weapons to Shiite groups that oppose the country’s ruling Sunni monarchy.
"Bahrain has many times wrongly made various accusations against Iran,” Hossein Amir Abdollahian, deputy foreign minister for Arabic and African affairs, told the semiofficial news outlet ISNA following the decision to expel the Iranian diplomat.
“Bahrain’s internal problems will be solved with national dialogue and participation of all parties,” he said, according to ISNA.
A nuclear deal that Iran struck in July with the U.S. and other foreign powers was supposed to help reduce the prospects of conflict in the region. But Gulf nations have continued to clash with Iran’s regional proxies and trade accusations with Tehran.
Saudi Arabian warplanes, supported by the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait, have bombarded Iran-backed Houthi militants in Yemen. Gulf-backed rebels are also challenging the Iranian-supported government of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria.
Bahrain has blamed Iran for a number of attacks by opposition groups against Bahraini security forces, including a bombing attack in July that killed two policemen on the Bahraini island of Sitra. Bahrain said the explosives used in the attack were similar to those it said it had seized in a foiled smuggling attempt, allegedly originating from Iran.
Mr. Al Hasan said the materials and methods of carrying out the attacks had evolved from crude gas cylinder bombs–carried out at the time of the 2011 Arab Spring protests—to sophisticated improvised explosive devices that Bahrain’s police are now discovering. He added that the manufacture of the IEDs demonstrated a high level of training, which was likely acquired in Iran or in Iraq with Iranian trainers.
