Rituals And Deaths In Bangladesh
By Fazal M. Kamal
06 March, 2014
Countercurrents.org
There are a large number of annual rituals that take place around the world. One of them is the dissemination of the yearly human rights report which is compiled by the United States government. Another ritual, which in fact is linked to this yearly publication, is the vehement denials and denunciations that are issued by the administrations of various countries on this score.
In this context it doesn’t require a whole lot of intelligence to detect that there are both facts and inaccuracies in such reports and the denials. After all, much is also dependent on perceptions. Additionally, it cannot be ignored that in the US itself there are many transgressions as well as inadequacies relating to universally-accepted human rights matters.
However, to take the case of Bangladesh it has to be accepted---if proof, evidence and realities are to be given any credence---that there in fact are sufficient cause to worry about the human rights situation (as is the case in many other countries too) especially because it’s not only the US State Department that has underscored this but all other independent monitoring organizations, both national and international, have been clamoring about the excesses, violations and rampant recklessness particularly of what are now loosely known as law enforcement entities.
For one instance, already in the first two months of this year there have been 43 deaths in what are invariably described by the authorities as deaths in “shootouts” or in “encounters” with law-enforcement personnel. Subsequently, the administration via the police also elaborates by stating that those who died had x number of criminal allegations against them.
These shot-to-death incidents have been persistently highlighted and criticized by international and Bangladeshi human rights monitors, but till now to no avail. In its February report Odhikar, the national rights organization which itself has also come under the dragnet of the government with its chief officials being arrested, for the umpteenth time underlined in its recommendations that:
“1. The government should take legal action against criminal acts perpetrated by its party activists. 2. The government must stop extrajudicial killings and also bring perpetrators to justice, through proper and independent investigation. 3. Incidents of torture by law enforcement agencies must be investigated and the perpetrators be brought to justice under criminal law. The government should ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture.”
The essentially indefensible issue of extrajudicial deaths has been on the radar of all rights monitoring entities for a number of years, and despite repeated assurances from the government that they would be investigated and hopefully stopped, the brash system of being judge, jury and executioner not only continued but---apparently most cynically---have increased after the gratuitous elections in Bangladesh early in the new year.
Certainly, it’s neither unique nor new-fangled when an administration’s message carrier defends some of the government’s actions and denies some others. Just as the incumbent regime’s state minister declared in a clear voice, “This government doesn’t believe in the politics of killing and forced disappearance. We can say steps have been taken against those carrying out terrorist activities.” Obviously, as the ancient adage goes, you can always give the dog a bad name and then hang it.
The state minister’s comments come against the well-etched backdrop of rampant human rights infringements by the security apparatus of the state. The impressive fact that has lately emerged is that the government, after years of practicing precisely what it promised it wouldn’t, now makes only feint gestures to deny any wrongdoing seemingly because it has concluded that no amount of protest---within and without the country---is going to make it alter its ways in any way. Given the government spokesman’s assertion here’s something from the US human rights compendium worth noting that provides a better perspective of what environment the administration has deliberately created in that country:
“The government restricted the operations of Odhikar [the human rights organization] through the August 10 arrest and two-month detention of its secretary, Adilur Rahman Khan (…); the August 11 seizure of five computers from Odhikar’s office; and the September 4 arrest warrant for the NGO’s president, Nasiruddin Elan. These actions began after the June publication of Odhikar’s report on the government’s use of force during the May 5-6 Hefazat rally, which cited 61 deaths, higher than the government’s figure of 11 (…).”
The report adds, “The government demanded Odhikar provide the names of those the NGO claimed died, but Odhikar refused to do so until the government furnished assurances of witness protection and agreed to investigate the events of May 5-6. The government determined the report was derogatory to the state and inflammatory, which led to Khan’s arrest. Odhikar’s staff in Dhaka and its network of volunteers in other districts reported additional harassment and claimed their telephone calls, e-mails, and movements were under constant surveillance by security officers. Odhikar failed to issue its monthly human rights monitoring reports during Khan’s detention.”
Clearly, the reality is that even though not just extrajudicial executions but “disappearances” of abducted people never to be heard from or about again, torture and degrading treatment of those arrested, random arrests and incarceration without regard to any form of due process, and the brazen in-your-face behavior of security personnel are all extensively recorded, well-established and common knowledge the administration isn’t in any mood to do anything at all to bring any of these under any kind of control, to say nothing of attempting to eliminate them.
The human rights picture in Bangladesh has been in a precipitous nosedive for some years and more so after the spurious elections in January. This electoral Pyrrhic victory apparently has emboldened many ruling party honchos to threaten anyone “creating unrest in the name of dissidence/opposition” with the amputation of their hands and legs! Evidently this is not the language of those who value democracy or human life. But with numerous cockalorums running wild, that’s not surprising in the least; rather this type of provocative and extreme words are to be expected.
While this steep decline continues presently there seems to be little possibility of the government reorienting its course whatever maybe the opinions and views of the rest of the world. And whatever maybe the cost to the nation.
The writer has been a media professional, in print and online newspapers as editor and commentator, and in public affairs, for over forty years.
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