Bahraini authorities on Sunday arrested three citizens over an alleged involvement in a network planning to shake the state's security and stability, state-run BNA news agency said.
"Mohamed Habib Mansour al-Safaf, known as Mohamed al-Moqdad, Said Mizra Ahmed, known as Said al-Nuri, and Abdulghani Ali Khanjar were arrested over collaboration with Abduljalil al- Singace and other in a network that aims to shake the country's security and stability," the agency said, quoted unnamed security source as saying.
Singace, an outspoken Shiite critic of the government, was arrested on Friday upon arrival at Bahrain International Airport from London, where he addressed a seminar at the House of Lords on the human rights situation in the Gulf state, Xinhua reported.
The statement did not define whether the three detainees were Shiite or not.
A security official said on Friday that Singace was arrested over spreading information in and outside the Gulf state that could undermine national security.
The network was conducting "illegal practices and other acts that aim for harming Bahrain's stability and civil peace and endangering the lives and properties of innocent citizens," the statement said.
It was also aiming to "use violence and terrorist acts and exploit houses of worship for other than their intended purposes," the release said.
The announcement came only one week after Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa set Oct. 23 as the date for the kingdom's parliamentary and municipal elections.
The elections will be the first since 2006 and the third since King Hamad took power in 1999 after the death of his father Sheikh Isa.
Bahrain, a Sunni-ruled Gulf kingdom with a Shiite majority, in 2002 held its first elections for nearly 30 years. In 2006, the Shiite opposition won 40 percent of the vote when al-Wefaq party won 17 seats in the 40-seat Council of Representatives.