Bahrain Still Has Friends At F1

After Jenson Button was car jacked in Brazil, Bernie Ecclestone explained that muggers 'look for anyone that looks like a soft touch and not too bright. The people that look a bit soft and simple, they will always have a go at'. Two weeks later Bernie was mugged in London and £200,000 worth of jewellery stolen from him and his girlfriend.
By his own definition the Formula 1 top banana is not too bright but even he must realise that holding a Grand Prix in a country where the public are currently being killed for demonstrating against the rulers is not a good idea.
For Bahrain's Al Khalifa royal family, things were not supposed to turn out this way and hosting the Grand Prix may have proved less of a prize than they were hoping.
By persuading the sport's governing authority to stage the race after it was cancelled last year, the ruling family sought to show that the recent upheaval was over yet if anything the opposite has happened with a spotlight being shone on the regime's brutal oppression of demonstrators and rejuvenating the demonstrations.
A spokesman for the Al Khaifa's explained that the tanks and rubber bullets that have left nearly a hundred dead was needed because the demonstrators had been infiltrated by a minority bent on violence and mayhem.
Strangely, that is the same reason the Syrian President, Bashar al-Assad, gave for him sending out the tanks to crush any rebellion but it seems some brutal dictators get a Grand Prix and others get sanctions.
We have the Olympics here is a little under 100 days and what with the way we have been behaving this last decade with highly questionable wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, our role in special rendition and torture and support for some of the most vile dictators in power, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that there could be some uncomfortable questions aimed at Britain as was asked about China's human rights record when they hosted the last Olympics.
Would also be interesting to see how any demonstrations are dealt with by the British Government, another strong possibility, when the running and jumping starts.