Washington made a great mistake during the caretaker government in 2007-08 by focusing more on elections instead of listening to people and focusing on reforms, said former US diplomat Jon Danilowicz.

"Broadly speaking, I am the first to acknowledge that the United States made great mistakes in the 2007 to 2008 period," he said in a conversation on "Navigating the Dynamics of Bangladesh–US Relations After the Mass Uprising".

The Centre for Governance Studies (CGS) organised an event featuring Jon Danilowicz and former US Ambassador to Bangladesh, William B Milam, at the Bangladesh Institute of International and Strategic Studies (BIISS) Auditorium today.

CGS Executive Director Zillur Rahman moderated the event.

Danilowicz, who was a political and economic counsellor of the US embassy in Bangladesh from September 2007 to August 2011, said he does not believe that the then US embassy had any role in 1/11 or there were some "secret groups" that instructed the people of Bangladesh what to do.
However, the US obviously expressed concerns about the direction in which things were heading when the then BNP-Jamaat alliance government was forced to step down amid nationwide violent demonstrations, he said.
Later, the military-backed caretaker government was formed and eventually, Awami League came to power through elections in 2009.

During that period, he said, they shared the goal of the then-caretaker government and perhaps that of the military and civil society of restoring democracy and making fundamental reforms.
"So, where I give the US credit is that we supported the reform agenda… we maintained contact with all sides, but we were limited in our understanding because of the situation," he said.
"A lot of the people whose voices needed to be heard couldn't be heard [because of the situation]."
He said the US government and perhaps others, including some within Bangladesh, gave too much importance to what the generals and brigadiers thought and didn't give enough attention to what the people of Bangladesh wanted.

"We talked with people, we talked with civil society, we talked with political parties, we talked with the caretaker government, but maybe we listened too much to the army. And I think that partially explains why perhaps things did not turn out the way we had hoped."
Jon Danilowicz said the other mistake the US embassy made was that it put too much emphasis on the elections and the election timeline.
"Elections are important. You can't have a [stable] government that isn't elected," he added.
However, he said significant reforms were needed to take place.
He said the caretaker government attempted to advance the reform agenda, but once it became clear that the priority was to simply hold elections and leave, they lost all of their leverage with the political parties.
He also claimed that the agreements that were reached between them were done in secret.
"So we really don't know to this day what the former prime minister agreed to in her negotiations with the then caretaker government. We, the US government at that time, weren't party to them.
"Our perception was that at that time the Awami League and Sheikh Hasina had learned lessons and were committed to reforms and would take forward the path that the caretaker government had set out.
"As history turned out, we were wrong in assuming that and in believing what we were being told and then we saw the steady decline which led us to the summer of 2024."
Now, he said, in many ways, what this interim government is doing is a reflection of lessons learnt from the past.
He said the interim government Chief Adviser Prof Yunus has his own profile and certainly those in the interim government are eminently capable of pursuing these reforms and fulfilling their mandate.

He thought that the government was heading in the right direction with steps like building national consensus on reforms, engaging with political parties, and maintaining the promise of handing power to civilian government.
Danilowicz said while he was critical of some of the decisions of the Biden administration, particularly related to the January 2024 elections, he was very pleased with how the US government responded immediately after August 5.
Beginning with the UN General Assembly and through the fall, the US very openly demonstrated its support for the reform agenda, understanding the importance of elections but not getting involved in setting an arbitrary date, he said.