Former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government was behind the possibility of a “crime against humanity” that last year strived to gain power, the United Nations says.
Before Hasina collapsed into a largely student-led revolution last August, her government oversaw a systematic crackdown on protesters with “hundreds of extrajudicial killings,” the UN Human Rights Office said on Wednesday. It was stated in the fact-detection report.
The results of the findings of the events in Bangladesh from July 1 to August 15 last year were “reasonable belief that crimes of murder, torture, imprisonment and other inhumane conduct have occurred.” He said there is a reason for this.”
These suspicious crimes committed by the government, along with violent elements of her Awamy League party and Bangladeshi security and intelligence reporting agency, have been part of a widespread and systematic attack on protesters and other civilians. Please ensure that this continues, according to the report,” the report states.
Hasina (77), who fled to asylum in neighbouring India, has already rebelled against an arrest warrant facing trial in Bangladesh for crimes against humanity.
Up to 1,400 people died in 45 days
The UN team discovered that Bangladeshi security forces supported the Hasina government through unrest. This began as a protest against the civil servant’s job assignments, and called for her to stop.
The Rights Bureau said the Hasina government has systematically attempted to curb the protest by increasingly violent means. It was estimated that “up to 1,400 people could have been killed” in these 45 days, and thousands were injured.
The majority of those killed were “shotted by Bangladeshi security forces,” the Rights Bureau said, adding that between 12 and 13% of those killed were minors.
The overall death projection in the UN report is much higher than the latest estimates by Bangladesh by the interim government in 834.
“The brutal response was a well-tuned strategy calculated by the former government to take power in the face of massive opposition,” UN’s Volker Turk said in a statement.
“As part of a strategy to suppress protests, hundreds of extrajudicial killings, extensive arbitrary arrests and detention and torture, with the knowledge, coordination and direction of political leaders and senior security guards, have been carried out. There is a reasonable basis for believing that this was.”
The UN office launched a fact-finding mission at the request of interim Bangladeshi leader Mohammed Yunus and sent a team to the country that includes human rights investigators, forensic doctors and weapons experts.
Wednesday’s report is based primarily on over 230 confidential in-depth interviews conducted in Bangladesh.
“Accountability and justice are essential for the healing of the nation and for Bangladesh’s future,” the Turks stressed, “The best way for Bangladesh to come is to face the terrible mistakes made during the period of question.” He said he did.
What was needed was “a comprehensive process of telling the truth, healing and accountability, rectifying the legacy of serious human rights abuses and ensuring that it never happens again,” he said.
Dozen died in custody: Rights Group
Meanwhile, Odhikaru, a leading rights group in Bangladeshi, said in a report on Wednesday that at least 12 people have been killed in detention since last year’s revolution with torture and gunshot wounds.
“The interim government should not be able to prevent these crimes from being punished,” Odhikar director ASM Nasiruddin Elan told AFP news agency. “People involved in extrajudicial killings must go to trial.”
Odhikar details Hasina’s 15-year rule that he engaged in widespread murders to strengthen her power, and accused the same institution of continuing human rights abuses since she fled. did.
Since she left, Bangladeshi security forces have made wipe-off arrests for loyalty, which blow away supporters of the Awami League Party and her “fascist” former government.
Odhikar detailed the 12 deaths that occurred between August 9th and December 31st, 2024.
Three of them were in police custody, while others were under the control of other security forces, including the military and multi-faceted paramilitary swift action battalions (RAB).
Odhikar said at least seven casualties were killed and four suffered gunshot wounds after torture. Another person was beaten and later pushed out of the bridge by police, he added.
Bangladeshi security forces are “investigating all the incidents,” military spokesperson Samud Doura Chowdhury told AFP.
Police spokesman Inamur Hak Sagar said officers were ordered to “withdraw activities beyond jurisdiction.”
“Even friends in the fascist regime have the right to justice,” said Elan of Odichal. “Extrajudicial killings need to be prevented at any cost.”
