WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Robert Gates held talks on Thursday with his counterpart in Bahrain, the Pentagon said, as anti-regime protests rocked the Gulf state.

In a phone conversation, Gates “discussed the current security situation with the Deputy Supreme Commander of the Bahraini Defense Force,” press secretary Geoff Morrell said in a statement.

Morrell offered no further details of the talks which coincided with an unprecedented wave of popular unrest sweeping the Middle East that has forced the leaders of Tunisia and Egypt from power.

Bahrain serves as headquarters for a pillar of American military power, the US Navy's Fifth Fleet, which commands a flotilla of vessels charged with safeguarding oil shipping lanes in the Gulf and countering Iran.