AN ARAB SPRING activist has slammed Britain’s “toxic” security relationship with Bahrain after it emerged that the head of the Gulf dictatorship’s military has been attending high-level talks in London.

Field Marshall Khalifa bin Ahmed al-Khalifa, commander-in-chief of Bahrain’s armed forces, was ushered into the Ministry of Defence (MoD) headquarters in Whitehall earlier this week to meet chief of the defence staff Sir Nicholas Carter.

But Sayed Ahmed al-Wadaei from the Bahrain Institute for Rights & Democracy (Bird) warned: “The toxic security relationship does nothing to protect the citizens of Bahrain.