TEHRAN (FNA)- Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Hassan Firouzabadi called on impartial international bodies to study the al-Khalifa dynasty's claim of having Bahraini origins.

"One of the high-ranking Bahraini security officials told me in a meeting 34 years ago that the al-Khalifa are stateless pirates and Saudi Arabia has paved the ground for their control over Bahrain island with the help of the British and the Bahraini people are out of patience with them," Firouzabadi said on Tuesday night.

"What should be now studied by unbiased international bodies is the documents of al-Khalifa's origin and nationality," he added.

Firouzabadi expressed regret that the current Bahraini ruler has turned the country into a prison in which people are tortured.

His remarks came after Bahrain's Interior Ministry announced in a statement on Monday the country's top Shiite cleric Ayatollah Sheikh Issa Qassim was stripped of his citizenship.

The latest move by the Bahrain regime against the country�s main opposition figures came as the Al-Khalifah regime is exerting mounting pressure on the opposition.

"Isa Ahmed Qassim has been stripped of his Bahraini citizenship," Bahrain state news agency cited the ministry�s statement, referring to the country's most senior Shiite Muslim cleric in Bahrain.

Bahrain has been in the throes of an uprising since February 2011, when hundreds of thousands of protesters took over a Central roundabout in the capital Manama and demanded political and democratic reform in the authoritarian kingdom.

Bahraini authorities backed by Persian Gulf allies, specially Saudi Arabia, violently broke up the protests, leading to the deaths of hundreds of people, and since then rallies have continued and human rights groups have accused the kingdom of imprisoning and torturing thousands of activists. Hundreds of others have gone missing without any trace or state explanation.

By Fars News Agency