AI REPORT
Culture of impunity encourages
extra-judicial killings
Staff Correspondent
The Amnesty International, in its annual report, claimed that at least 54 people died in suspected extra-judicial executions by the police and the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) in the first six months of this regime, but no police or RAB personnel were prosecuted for the killings.
AI's secretary general Irene Khan on Thursday unveiled the report that pointed out that thousands of slum-dwellers were forcibly evicted in the capital and other major cities, and their homes were demolished without any provision of compensation or alternative accommodation.
The report said that according to the government, mandatory judicial inquiries into all fatal shootings by police and RAB were carried out, and found them to be justified. The number of judicial inquiries conducted and the findings of such inquiries were not made public.
The report also mentioned that the police used excessive force against peaceful demonstrators on several occasions.
It also pointed out that Bengali settlers continue to grab the land belonging to the indigenous inhabitants of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
'Three UN Special Rapporteurs — on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, on adequate housing and on the right to food — expressed concern that there may be a systematic campaign to support the relocation of non-indigenous people to the Chittagong Hill Tracts in order to outnumber the local indigenous community,' said the AI annual report.
In March the government announced amendments to the National Women Development Policy in order to further promote equality for women but they were not implemented because the policy faced fierce resistance from Islamist groups who rallied in protest, saying the amendments defied the Islamic laws on inheritance.
The report said women continue to be discriminated against in law and in practice, and violence against women, including beating, acid attacks and dowry deaths, is still widespread.
The AI's report pointed out that restrictions on freedom of expression were not strictly enforced and were eventually lifted in November, and although some restrictions on freedom of assembly and association were lifted in May and November, many restrictions remained under the state of emergency until it was lifted on December 17.
'The ban on indoor political meetings was lifted in May but some 30,000 political activists from various parties were arrested, reportedly as they gathered in their party offices soon after the announcement. The police detained them for periods between several days and two months before releasing them, either without charge or on bail after charging them with apparently unrelated criminal offences,' said the report, adding that though the government announced the partial withdrawal of the ban on political rallies on November 3, it was not implemented until 12 December.
The right to fair trials continued to be undermined and was further exacerbated by the emergency regulations, as defendants' access to due process of law was limited, mentioned the report.
The report pointed out that the government continued to use the army, alongside the police, the RAB and other security forces, to maintain law and order.
'The army, which had been deployed to maintain law and order since January 2007, was temporarily withdrawn in early November but redeployed on December 18 until after the elections,' observed the AI's report.
It pointed out that the political struggle between the military-backed caretaker government and veteran political leaders dominated the headlines in 2008.
The report also said that hundreds of millions of people of the countries in the Asia-Pacific region are suffering due to government policies.
Family of slain polytech student
to file murder case
Two RAB 'crossfire' victims were BCL activists
Staff Correspondent
'We have decided to file a murder a case against RAB as they committed the extra-judicial killing being instigated by some expelled activists of Chhatra League,' Mohsin's brother Farhad Sheikh told New Age.
Mohsin Sheikh, a fourth-year student of electrical engineering department and Mohammad Ali Jinnah, a third-year student of mechanical engineering department of the institute, were killed in what Rapid Action Battalion described as a 'shootout' at Manik Mia Avenue near Asad Gate early Thursday.
The bodies of the slain students were handed over to their families after post-mortem examination at Dhaka Medical College Hospital morgue on Thursday afternoon and they were buried in family graveyards at their village homes in Bhola and Faridpur.
The director general of RAB, Hasan Mahmud Khandakar, told New Age, 'Two students were killed in a "shootout" when they were engaged in "snatching".'
'Two separate cases were filed in this connection and we are investigating the incident,' he said.
To a query about continued extra-judicial killings by the law enforcers, the RAB chief said, 'If lawmen come under attack from miscreants, they can return fire in self-defence and it may result in loss of lives which cannot be called extra-judicial killing.'
RAB claimed that the two slain students were 'criminals' and 'muggers' but the teachers and students of the institute insisted that the two boys had no criminal records.
Students of the institute said Mohsin and Jinnah were activists of the Bangladesh Chhatra League and linked to 'Zakir group' ousted by their rivals from the campus.
Students of the institute alleged that RAB men in plainclothes picked up Mohsin and Jinnah when they came out of the hall for having tea on the campus in the night.
A classmate of Mohsin told New Age, 'After hearing the news of their [Mohsin and Jinnah] being picked up by RAB, we tried to contact them over mobile phone but some people identifying themselves as members of RAB-2, received the calls and even said who they were.'
Tension was simmering on the campus following the killing of the two students. General students alleged that two groups of BCL, led by Shahin and Shaon and with the blessing of a local ward commissioner, had unleashed terror on the campus and forcibly occupied several rooms of Latif Hall.
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