Bahrain court jails 17 on bombing

A Bahrain court sentenced 17 Shiite activists to 15 years in prison on Sunday after convicting them of the attempted murder of four policemen in a bomb attack in April last year, a judicial source told AFP. The defendants were found guilty of detonating a roadside bomb in the Shiite village of Aker that wounded four members of a passing police patrol, the source said. Meanwhile, state news agency BNA reported that an Asian worker was wounded in an "act of terrorism" when a home-made explosive device went off at a bike repair shop outside a boys' school near the eastern village of Muharraq. "The blast resulted in hand injuries to an Asian worker who was rushed to hospital," said the police statement on BNA. Sunni-ruled Shiite-majority Bahrain has seen two years of political unrest linked to opposition demands for a constitutional monarchy that has killed at least 80 people, according to human rights watchdogs. The small but strategic island state lies across the Gulf from Iran and is home to the US Fifth Fleet.