Professor Muhammad Yunus, chief adviser to the interim government, today thanked the UN's Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) for undertaking the most thorough independent investigation to date into the events in Bangladesh in July and August that ended the Hasina regime.
He reiterated the interim government's commitment to upholding the rule of law and called on all members of Bangladesh's justice system, including the police, prosecutors and judges, to do the same, said a press release of his office.
"I, along with everyone else working in the interim government and millions of other Bangladeshis, am committed to transforming Bangladesh into a country in which all its people can live in security and dignity," the chief adviser said.
"As the report notes, the long years of the Hasina regime have left Bangladesh with 'structural deficiencies' in the law enforcement and justice sectors. The reform of these institutions is crucial to Bangladesh's transformation into a society where all its people can live in security and dignity. I call on everyone working inside these institutions to side with justice, the law, and the people of Bangladesh in holding to account their own peers and others who have broken the law and violated the human and civil rights of their fellow citizens," he added.
The OHCHR conducted its investigation at the invitation of Bangladesh's interim government. Its report identified extensive and grave human rights violations, including alleged extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, torture, and disproportionate use of force by the Sheikh Hasina-led government and elements associated with the Awami League, as well as a broader array of security and intelligence agencies.
"OHCHR finds that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the former government and its security and intelligence apparatus, together with violent elements associated with the Awami League, systematically engaged in serious human rights violations, including hundreds of extrajudicial killings, other violations of the use of force involving serious injuries to thousands of protesters, extensive arbitrary arrests and detention, and torture and other forms of ill-treatment. OHCHR further has reasonable grounds to believe that these violations were carried out with the knowledge, coordination and direction of the political leadership and senior security sector officials," it said.
"OHCHR assesses that as many as 1,400 people could have been killed during the protests, the vast majority of whom were killed by military rifles and shotguns loaded with lethal metal pellets commonly used by Bangladesh's security forces. Thousands more suffered severe, often life-altering injuries. More than 11,700 people were arrested and detained, according to the police and Rab. Reported fatality figures indicate that around 12-13 percent of those killed were children. The police and other security forces also subjected children to targeted killings, deliberate maiming, arbitrary arrest, detention in inhumane conditions, torture and other forms of ill-treatment. Having been at the forefront of the early protests in particular, women and girls were also attacked by security forces and Awami League supporters. They were specifically subjected to sexual and gender-based violence, including gender-based physical violence, threats of rape and, in some documented cases, sexual assault perpetrated by Awami League supporters," it added.
The report further stated, "Based on first-hand testimonies from victims and witnesses, and image and video analysis, OHCHR could ascertain that, as protests expanded, a broad array of armed Awami League supporters acted jointly, or in close coordination, with the police against protesters, using extensive, unlawful violence to support the government's efforts to suppress the protests."
"In many operations, armed Awami League supporters lined up alongside the police or sheltered behind police lines before launching attacks timed to support the police's own efforts to disperse the protests violently. Awami League supporters also stopped and searched people, apprehended protesters, and handed them over to the police in an organised, seemingly prearranged fashion," it added.
The report also mentioned that the Bangladesh police had provided OHCHR with the names and functions of 95 members of the police, Awami League or Awami League-affiliated organisations whom the police consider to have provided weapons to citizens for use in violent attacks during the protests, including 10 persons who were members of parliament at the time, 14 local Awami League leaders, 16 Jubo League leaders, 16 Chhatra League leaders and seven members of the police.
On the evening of July 18, the then home affairs minister chaired a meeting of the 'Core Committee', attended by the heads of the police, RAB, BGB and intelligence leaders. At the meeting, the minister told the BGB commander, in front of the other senior security sector leaders, to use lethal force more readily, as one of the meeting participants related to OHCHR, according to the report.
"Senior official testimony also indicated that, in a meeting held the next day, the prime minister herself told security force officials to kill protesters to quell the protests and specifically demanded to 'arrest the ringleaders of the protests, the troublemakers, kill them and hide their bodies'," said the report.
The report, which acknowledged the cooperation of Bangladeshi authorities with its investigators, noted, "Following the fall of the previous government, the current interim government has commenced efforts to ensure accountability for serious human rights violations and abuses. Among its steps, it has brought cases against senior officials before Bangladesh's International Crimes Tribunal (ICT), as well as in the regular courts. These efforts have been hampered, to differing degrees, by pre-existing structural deficiencies in the law enforcement and justice sectors, established police malpractices such as bringing meritless charges based on mass cases, continued intimidation and evidence tampering by some security officials who face allegations but remain in their positions, as well as other due process concerns related to ICT and regular courts."