On 17 March 2011, Jihan Kazerooni, a young Bahraini Sunni from a family supportive of the government, went to see for herself what was happening at the Pearl roundabout, then the epicentre of Manama’s pro-democracy movement.

“I saw police hitting men, women and children, even though the people had no weapons,” says Kazerooni. By the end of that day she had switched allegiances and is now among a small minority of Bahraini Sunnis supportive of the opposition movement. “It is very rare in my family, considering the standards that we live in, to support the opposition,” she adds. “But what could I do when I see that our people are dying?”

Radicalising effect of unrest in Bahrain

Kazerooni has since joined the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, a well-known critic of the Al-Khalifa regime. While she has switched sides, for many others in Bahrain, the unrest of 2011 has had a far more radicalising effect.

The political spectrum now encompasses everyone from radical Shias demanding the overthrow of the Al-Khalifa family, to extreme Sunnis, who oppose any sign of ceding power to the opposition. Some Sunnis would prefer to see greater Saudi control over the situation, rather than let the Shias take over parliament through democratic reform.

King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa has indicated he is still prepared for talks and that the doors of dialogue are open

To make matters worse, both the government and major opposition groups such as Al-Wefaq, the main Shia party, are losing grip on the more extremist elements of either side. “Even if the government made a deal with the opposition, there is no guarantee now that they would take the hardline Sunnis with them,” says a senior Western diplomat based in Manama.

“Some Sunnis now really hate the Shias,” says one Bahraini Sunni.

On the opposite side, the increasingly aggressive protests show that Al-Wefaq’s call for the pro-democracy movement to remain non-violent is starting to fall on deaf ears. While the group only stages demonstrations with the permission of the government, the peaceful gatherings are often followed by violent protests led by smaller splinter groups.

There also remain questions about the role of the organisers behind the massive protests that started on 14 February 2011, inspired by the toppling of hated dictators such as Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak. The leaders of the original protest movement remain unknown. As a result, the ability of Al-Wefaq to get young protesters off the street is uncertain.

“Al-Wefaq can’t have it both ways,” says the diplomat. “They can’t say they negotiate on behalf of Shias and then say they don’t control the street.”

This puts the government in a difficult position. Attempts at a dialogue with the opposition have been under way since mid-January. Royal Court Minister Khalid bin Ahmed al-Khalifa has led negotiations for the government and has met with several opposition groups to discuss the possibility of renewed attempts to agree a reform package that would restore stability.

Not a single one of the Bahrain Commission of Inquiry recommendations has been fully implemented

Jawad Fairooz, Al-Wefaq member

Khalid bin Ahmed is regarded as one of the prime minister’s men. That puts him in the camp of the hardliners, who generally oppose rewarding the protest movement with reforms. Opposition members say they would still prefer to deal with Crown Prince Salman bin Ahmed al-Khalifa, but after they rejected a fairly radical reform package offered by him last March, the crown prince now lacks the political capital to negotiate on behalf of the government.

“Khalid bin Ahmed is under pressure from the ruler now to deliver and although he is not the favoured negotiating partner, at least he is in a position to deliver if some reforms are agreed on,” says one opposition member in Bahrain.

Dialogue welcomed by Bahrain

King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa has indicated he is still prepared for talks. “The doors of dialogue continue to be open,” he declared on 20 March. The previous day, opposition groups, including Al-Wefaq and the National Democratic Action Society (Waad), also confirmed they were open to a dialogue “without preconditions” with the government.

However, they added that a list of demands drawn up by five opposition groups, known as the Manama Document, would be the minimum they would expect to get out of the process. These demands include democratic reforms, the ability of parliament to vote on their confidence in the prime minister and a redrawing of electoral constituencies to address gerrymandering, which leaves the majority of the population electing less than half of the seats in the lower house of parliament.

The government is not just under internal pressure to resolve the rift. Saudi Arabia, an ally of Bahrain that provided troops last March to help the ruling regime drive protesters out of Manama, is eager to restore stability to the country. It fears that Bahrain’s uprising will inspire similar revolts in its own restive Shia community in the Eastern Province.

In the past few months, Saudi representatives have met with the government and Al-Wefaq to determine how they see the situation moving forward, according to the diplomat.

While politicians talk about the potential for dialogue, the situation outside Manama remains dire. Protests in the Shia villages around Bahrain have become an almost daily occurrence. Groups of women gather together and shout ‘Down, down, Hamad,” calling for the removal of the king. Young men, with faces covered by gas masks or scarves, hurl Molotov cocktails at police.

Village protests in Bahrain increasingly aggressive

Although not as large in scale or as disruptive to the capital as the protests last year, the confrontations in the villages are in danger of becoming increasingly aggressive. The police use tear gas, sound grenades and fire bird shot to disperse the crowds. The extent of the use of tear gas has led to several deaths.

John Timoney, a US police chief hired by Bahrain to help it improve policing standards, has defended the use of tear gas. “The police are using tear gas to create a distance between them and the people throwing Molotov cocktails,” he says.

US-based campaign group Physicians for Human Rights says excessive tear gas or the impact of tear gas canisters has been responsible for 20 deaths in Bahrain since the start of 2012.

A reform of the police force is clearly occurring, but not fast enough for noticeable changes on the streets. Cameras have been installed in police stations to ensure that prisoners are not abused, a code of conduct has been compiled and training programmes have been launched. As a result, activists allege that the police are now beating up people in secret detention centres or simply doing it on the streets.

Elsewhere in Bahrain, other reforms are under way. An independent ombudsman has been established to investigate allegations of abuse by the security forces. Investigations into the deaths and mistreatment of prisoners during last year’s protests have been transferred from the Interior Ministry to the public prosecutor.

The government also says that charges relating to free speech have been dropped and that medics tried for treating protesters injured in the brutal crackdown on demonstrations in February and March 2011 will be retried in a civilian court, after originally having their cases heard in a military court. Other reforms include giving parliament the power to question ministers and approve or disapprove of the government’s agenda following every election.

The reforms have come on the back of an independent report, the Bahrain Commission of Inquiry (BICI), commissioned by King Hamad to investigate last year’s protests and recommend what the country needs to move on. The king has praised the “significant and broad progress” made in implementing the BICI recommendations, which the government says is about 90 per cent complete.

The challenge for the government now is to ensure that the reforms it has undertaken start to have an effect on the streets. So far, the changes that have been implemented are often arcane legislative amendments that the opposition claims have not gone far enough. Until real change that is noticeable around the country starts to occur, protests and instability will remain a common feature of life in Bahrain.

Insufficient reforms for some Bahrainis

Al-Wefaq says that the modest reforms have not gone far enough to affect the mood on the streets. “Not a single one of the BICI recommendations has been implemented in full,” says Jawad Fairooz, a member of Al-Wefaq.

Increasingly, the danger is that both sides will drift even further apart. Until now, attempts at dialogue have yielded nothing. Fairooz says that in meetings with Khalid bin Ahmed, it has been unclear how much of a mandate he really has from the government. In the meantime, the radical elements of both sides seem to be gaining influence.

“There is not much goodwill on either side,” says the head of one local company. This increases the potential for upsetting the extremes of either side.

“Some of the reforms made by the government have been really significant, but they feel they can’t talk them up too much for fear of riling the Sunni community,” says the diplomat.

In the short term, Bahrain’s tense environment will continue. With the Bahrain Formula One Grand Prix scheduled to take place in late April, activists have been handed a global audience to air their grievances with the regime. Protesters are expected to try and disrupt the race.

Reforms in areas such as policing and curbing some of the most egregious human rights violations have been marred by the lack of progress in reaching a political solution. Until that occurs, clashes between the police and young demonstrators are unlikely to stop.

“Even if the government does its best to solve the problem of human rights violations, there can be no return to stability without solving the political issues in Bahrain,” says Fairooz.