Crackdown at dawn: Bahrain police target dissident cleric's supporters

Security forces in Bahrain carried out a dawn raid on Thursday against supporters of a Shia cleric on trial in the Sunni-ruled kingdom during which one man was shot and wounded, witnesses said.

Security forces intervened in the village of Diraz, west of the capital, where protesters have been staging sit-ins since authorities revoked Sheikh Isa Qassim's citizenship in June.

He is accused of sowing sectarian divisions in the Shia-majority Gulf archipelago, home to the US Fifth Fleet.

A 21-year-old man was hospitalised with a bullet wound to his head after the raid, human rights campaigners said quoting a medical source.

Dozens of residents in Diraz later staged a protest chanting slogans hostile to the authorities, witnesses said.

The trial of the 75-year-old cleric on charges of illegal fundraising and money laundering opened in July. A new hearing is scheduled for Monday. 

Qassim has also been accused by the interior ministry of "serving foreign interests" - an allusion to Shia-dominated Iran.

Bahrain has been rocked by unrest since security forces crushed Shia-led protests demanding a constitutional monarchy and an elected prime minister in 2011.