Chai-walla tête-à-tête with the inventor of social business

SALEEM SAMAD

News media in Bangladesh and India were agog due to the news that Prof Muhammad Yunus, Chief Advisor of the Interim Government, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met officially for the first time in a decade on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC Summit in Bangkok, Thailand, on 4 April.

The meeting buried all speculations on the question of ‘to be or not to be’ a tête-à-tête meeting between two neighboring countries, Bangladesh and India. They sat down for a meeting eight months after the change of guards in Bangladesh, after the bloody street protest, which ousted autocrat Sheikh Hasina from power.

The leaders of these two major South Asian countries greeted each other with mutual respect and a shared openness for dialogue. Their 40-minute exchange was candid, productive, and constructive, the Indian official spokesperson said.

Narendra Modi in a Tweet (now X) says: [I met] “Mr. Muhammad Yunus, the Chief Adviser of the interim government of Bangladesh. India remains committed to a constructive and people-centric relationship with Bangladesh. “I reiterated India’s support for peace, stability, inclusivity and democracy in Bangladesh. Discussed measures to prevent illegal border crossings and expressed our serious concern for the safety and well-being of Hindus and other minorities.”

The meeting was supposedly engineered by Pranay Kumar Verma, the Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, who had made it possible for Yunus and Modi to meet face-to-face. Professor Yunus enquired about the status of Bangladesh’s formal request for the extradition of Sheikh Hasina, the former Prime Minister of Bangladesh, which remains pending with the Indian government. The journalists were told that Bangladesh reiterated Hasina’s possible extradition plan, India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said. “There were talks on Sheikh Hasina’s extradition. Can’t say more on that,” he furthermore added.

Modi was told that Hasina had been making inflammatory remarks and accusations against the interim government of Bangladesh to various media outlets and attempting to destabilize the situation in Bangladesh, which seemed to be an abuse of the hospitality India has extended to her. “We request that the Government of India take appropriate measures to restrain her from continuing to make such incendiary statements while she remains in your country,” his press secretary, Shafiqul Alam stated.

Indian Prime Minister promptly blamed social media for the tensions around Sheikh Hasina’s remarks. However, Modi, in response to Hasina’s issue, stated that “rhetoric that vitiates the environment” is best avoided. One of the things he said in the meeting was that while India had good relations with Sheikh Hasina, “We saw her disrespectful behavior towards you. But we continued to respect and honor you.”

He clarified that India’s attachment is with a country, not with any individuals or political organization. “Our relationship is people-to-people,” Modi told Yunus. What he meant was that India did not pledge loyalty to Awami League only. Although in reality, Delhi has put all its eggs in one basket during 15-years of Hasina’s misrule.

India deliberately avoided mentioning the July-August uprising – Monsoon Revolution when 1,400 students and protesters (figure quoted from OHCHR Fact-Finding Report, February 2025) were killed by law enforcement forces and armed Awami League vigilantes. The UN report notes that the Prime Minister herself had ordered security forces to kill protesters  and specifically instructed them to “arrest the ringleaders, kill them, and hide their bodies.”

Hasina had pathological hatred against the opposition, critics, dissidents, independent journalists, human rights activists and social media users. The journalists, critics, human rights activists and social media influencers were booked under non-bailable charges under repressive cybercrime laws.

India or the Indian media hardly reacted to Hasina’s repressive regime. She ruled the country with an iron hand. This was the reason for rising enforced disappearances, the encampment in secret prisons managed by dreaded security agencies and extra-judicial deaths with impunity.

Public opinion in Bangladesh has turned against India over its decision to provide sanctuary to fugitive Hasina, while the Dhaka courts are waiting to put her on the dock for alleged crimes against humanity during the July-August street protests.

Regarding the official statement of Vikram Misri, it is argued that despite India having a functional democracy for seven decades, Delhi never gave sermons to Hasina to hold an inclusive election in 2014, 2018 and 2024. Instead, the Indian Prime Minister promptly congratulated Hasina for being re-elected to power.

All three elections were flawed. The regime kept tens of thousands languishing in prison until the elections were over, according to election observers and human rights groups. The bilateral relations plunged through the cracks of the fault line after India decided to give political shelter to ousted Sheikh Hasina in August last year.

“PM Modi reiterated India’s support for democratic, stable, peaceful, progressive and inclusive Bangladesh. He underlined India’s desire to forge a positive and constructive relationship with Bangladesh. The PM also urged that any rhetoric that vitiates the environment is best avoided,” Misri said.

Modi underlined India’s concerns over the safety and security of minorities, including Hindus in Bangladesh, and expressed his expectation that the Bangladesh government would ensure their security, including by thoroughly investigating the cases of atrocities committed against them. Responding to Modi’s concern over the condition of minorities in Bangladesh, the Chief Adviser said the reports of attacks on the minorities were hugely inflated and “the bulk of them were fake news”.

Yunus said he has instituted an effective system for monitoring every incident of religious and gender violence in the country, and his government was taking serious actions to stop any occurrence of such incidents. Yunus also raised the issue of border killings and stressed the need of working together to reduce the number of fatalities. “On the border, strict enforcement of the law and prevention of illegal border crossings, especially at night, is necessary for maintaining border security and stability. The bilateral mechanism could meet as appropriate to review and take forward our ties,” reads the Indian press statement. Modi furthermore explained that the Indian border troops opened fire only in self-defense and the fatalities occurred in Indian territories.

The leaders agreed that strict enforcement of the law and prevention of illegal crossings would help to build trust and confidence and to strengthen the relationship between India and Bangladesh. India’s inconsistent stance on border killings has contributed to a rise in anti-India sentiments in Bangladesh.

Bangladesh's Chief Adviser’s Office gave a strong diplomatic message to India and the Indians when a photograph was presented to Modi. The photo is about Narendra Modi presenting a gold medal to Nobel laureate Professor Yunus at the 102nd Indian Science Congress that took place in Mumbai on 3 January 2015. The Indians cannot deny that Modi knew the inventor of social business and micro-credit, which salvaged millions of disadvantaged women from poverty.

Addressing the challenges facing the relationship between the two countries, Professor Yunus said, “Excellency, we seek to work together with you to set the relationship on the right track for the benefit of both our peoples.” “Bangladesh deeply values its relationship with India,” said Professor Yunus. “The deep-rooted friendship between our two countries is founded on intertwined histories, geographical proximity, and cultural affinity. We remain thankful for the unwavering support of the government and people of India during our most challenging time in 1971 [the brutal birth of Bangladesh].”

Al Jazeera writes: “Sheikh Hasina’s overthrow sent Bangladesh’s relationship with neighboring India into a tailspin, culminating in Yunus choosing to make his first state visit last month to China – India’s biggest rival. “Bangladesh has also moved closer to India’s arch-enemy Pakistan amid the diplomatic chill,” Al Jazeera remarked.

In an editorial, the largest circulated independent newspaper, the Prothom Alo writes: “Though delayed, we welcome the high-level meeting between Bangladesh and India. At the same time, we believe that one or two meetings alone are not sufficient to resolve the ongoing tensions in the bilateral relations of the two countries. Dialogue must be sustained at all levels. Bangladesh had long emphasized the need for such a meeting between the two heads of government.

“Since the fall of the Awami League government on 5 August last year and former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina seeking refuge in India, there have been certain strains in Bangladesh-India relations. Although the political transition in Bangladesh is entirely an internal matter, policymakers in Delhi have found it difficult to accept this reality.”

Prothom Alo urged for healthy bilateral relations, communication and movement between the peoples of both nations as essential.

Writer and researcher Mohiuddin Ahmad lamented that India has imposed a blanket moratorium on the issuance of visas to Bangladeshi nationals since August last year. The non-issuance of visas halted three direct train and bus services. The flights between the two countries have also significantly reduced. Bangladesh did not reciprocate to the Indian visa regime policy and instead asked all missions to issue visas to Indian nationals, especially for journalists on the fast track.

Another bone of contention was water sharing. Bangladesh and India not only share a land border of nearly four thousand kilometers but also 54 common rivers. While the issue of the land boundary was resolved during the tenure of the Modi government, the matter of water sharing from the common rivers remains unsettled. The Ganges water-sharing treaty is set to expire in 2026.

Harsh Pant, foreign policy head at the Observer Research Foundation, an Indian think tank, expressed hope that the meeting between Modi and Yunus would “start the process of rebuilding some engagement” between the two historically close nations. Several think tanks on both sides of the border stated after the meeting took place that it was clear that India wants to chart a new course in its relationships with Bangladesh.

First published in the Stratheia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan on 7 April 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

Bangladesh: The Guardian of The Bay of Bengal!

Saleem Samad

The hostile Indian “Godi Media” is once again rolling up their sleeves after Nobel laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus said that, “We Are The Only Guardian Of Ocean…”

Hours before Prof Yunus arrived in Dhaka (before taking oath of public office as Chief Adviser of an Interim Government), he spoke to India’s popular 24/7 news channel NDTV. He said that “if Bangladesh becomes unstable, it will affect [neighboring] West Bengal, Myanmar, and the entire North East India.”

Such a statement by Yunus did raise eyebrows of Delhi-wallas but they did not officially react. Once again, when he mentioned that the North East India (collectively known as the “Seven Sisters”) is landlocked. He suggested that if the Indian states in the North East are given access to the ocean, it will make its economy vibrant and create backward linkage industries which will create employment opportunities for people on both sides of the border.

However, Assam’s (a member of Seven Sisters) Chief Minister, Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma, in a reaction says Yunus’s ploy in stating North East is “landlocked” and proposal to open the region to the “oceans” is a sinister threat and provocative to severe North East from mainland India.

In fact, such a proposal was first given by the Japanese in 2022 that they will help India’s North East to set up industries and infrastructure to reach Bay of Bengal – the maritime routes to export destinations. For Japan, India’s North East has been in focus for some time. Japan has shown an urgency to build an integrated and scaled-up supply chain in the region as it plans to boost its presence and increase investments.

South Asian countries are among the least connected and integrated in the world today, writes Mahua Venkatesh in an influential India Narrative news portal. Bangladesh will indeed be a “game-changer” for the region as it would open up connectivity with India’s North East, especially Tripura and Assam, along with landlocked Nepal and Bhutan, when the US 1.5 billion seaport becomes functional.

During a trip to India, Japan’s former Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida, (2021 to 2024) in March 2023 highlighted the importance of strengthening connectivity in the North East region, rich in resources but relatively untapped, for developing robust global supply chains.

When Kishida proposed developing an industrial hub in Bangladesh with “supply chains” to the landlocked North Eastern states of India, and to Nepal and Bhutan beyond by developing a port and transport in the region, “to foster the growth of the entire region,” hardly anybody understood the depth of his vision, writes Venkatesh. The Indian government was upbeat about the Japanese proposal. Soon after a Japanese delegation held parleys with stakeholders on the yawning economic opportunities for the North East region.

Welcoming Japan’s initiative, the Japanese, Indian and Bangladeshi officials also discussed the plans with G. Kishan Reddy, India’s Federal Minister for the North East. At that time the Godi media, or the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), advocating Hindutva (true ‘Indian’ partakes of this ‘Hindu-ness’) did not make any hue and cry nor did it raise “territorial claim” of North East.

Interestingly, history says the British Raj understood their political grievances and gave those princely states reasonable political autonomy which kept them in good humor. However, Delhi systematically ignored the Seven Sisters in scaling up infrastructure development for economic, industrial growth and emancipation of the people. The economic hardship, poverty and controversial state policy agenda went against the ethnic communities in North East states.

Delhi’s bureaucrats responsible for negotiating the political agenda of the ethnic leaders were mishandled. Failing in negotiations with the ethnic leaders, the region plunged into a deadly political crisis and thousands of military and para-military forces were deployed. The soldiers did not speak their language and did not understand their culture and they were blamed for committing human rights abuses during anti-insurgency operations against armed separatists, who were divided into several ethnic groups and sub-groups.

Initially, India refused to hold peace talks with the ethnic leaders blaming the armed insurrections that were aided and abetted by China and Pakistan in the 70s.

Pakistan came into the scenario when Bangladesh was an eastern province of Pakistan. The rogue military dictator General Ayub Khan (later President) provided political and material support to the separatist ethnic groups. Ayub Khan was once GOC and stationed in Dhaka. He knew the region. It’s a long story!

Most of the Indian officials and central politicians have little knowledge about states in north east and journalists travelling to Delhi for meetings or seminars used to hear strange stories about the region. Once, a journalist Anirban Rai, who worked for the Hindustan Times, went to the head office of an airlines at the ticket reservation counter to reconfirm his return flight to Guwahati, state capital of Assam. He was asked to produce his passport, which made him angry!

A fresh conspiracy theory has been cooked up that giving access to the ocean by Bangladesh challenges India’s regional security.

The feel-good project to serve as a key port for the landlocked North East Indian states is expected to be commercially operational in 2030. The economic development will immensely contribute to the rich cultural heritage of the millions of vibrant communities living in the region, bordering China on the side and restive Myanmar in the South. Meanwhile, projects for road and railway connectivity projects to the desired port from the Seven Sisters are almost completed by the Indian and Bangladesh governments.

Though Delhi has not issued any official statement, former senior officials like Ambassador Veena Sikri said Yunus is not politically empowered to negotiate with China to expand the Bay of Bengal to India’s arch-enemy and open the gateway to the ocean for North East.

One must admit that China, through its infrastructure investments, has made major inroads into Bangladesh after 2009, when Sheikh Hasina was re-elected backed by India (according to Indian President Pranab Mukherjee’s autobiography The Coalition Years), since Modi’s government was hesitant to continue strengthening bilateral ties with Dhaka.

What the Godi media do not discuss is that Bangladesh is the guardian of the Bay of Bengal, the world’s largest bay, which forms the southern border of Bangladesh, covering an area of approximately 2.17 million square kilometers and is a crucial part of the Indian Ocean.

Bangladesh has sovereign rights for the exploration, exploitation, conservation, and management of natural resources, including both living and non-living resources.

Bangladesh has delimited its maritime boundaries with India and Myanmar through arbitration, ensuring a fair and equitable division of maritime zones in the Bay of Bengal. The 12-nautical mile territorial sea, a 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ), and a continental shelf extending up to 350 nautical miles, according to international law and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), Bangladesh has maritime rights in the bay.

The Indian TV news blames Yunus for recalibrating its compass towards Beijing and has crossed the red line for anti-India rants while visiting China, and they argue that his government is not legitimate. Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Wilson Center in Washington said Bangladesh has become a battleground for great power competition.

India’s ruling BJP and the South Block in New Delhi must stop looking at Bangladesh through the lens of Sheikh Hasina, who has fled Dhaka and taken shelter somewhere in New Delhi.

First published in the Stratheia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan on 2 May 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

India shies over Yunus-Modi talks

SALEEM SAMAD

India has not declined a meeting with Nobel laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus, Chief adviser of Bangladesh Interim Government and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

South Block in New Delhi did not respond to a request for Yunus-Modi state-level bilateral meeting in New Delhi. Through diplomatic channels Yunus administration requested for a bilateral visit in December 2024.

Nor did Delhi respond to a meeting on the sidelines of BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) on 3-4 April in Bangkok, Thailand.

Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar remained non-committal, saying “Bangladesh’s request for a meeting between its interim government’s Chief Advisor Muhammad Yunus and Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the upcoming BIMSTEC Summit is under consideration.”

BIMSTEC is a regional organization of seven countries (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Thailand) focused on promoting economic and technical cooperation in the Bay of Bengal region, with its secretariat located in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

The platform dropped Pakistan and Maldives giving a flimsy excuse that the countries do not share the Bay of Bengal. Whereas, Nepal and Bhutan do not have shores with the Bay of Bengal but are said to be beneficiaries of the sea.

Meanwhile, the independent Indian newspaper The Hindu reported on 25 March that Yunus wanted to visit India before China, but did not receive a positive response, quoting Press Secretary Shafiqul Alam to Prof Yunus’s administration.

Yunus seeks bilateral ties with India before visiting China, pitching Bangladesh as a business-friendly destination, writes Kallol Bhattacherjee in the Hindu.

Bangladesh is still waiting for a response from India for a meeting between Yunus and Modi on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC summit.

Chief Adviser of the interim government of Bangladesh desired to travel to India before visiting China but Dhaka’s request for the visit did not elicit a “positive” Indian response, said Alam.

Yunus is the second leader from South Asia to be hosted in China in four months. Nepal’s Prime Minister K. P. Sharma Oli travelled to China in December 2024 on an official visit.

Like the formal request to extradite ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in December last year, the meeting between the two heads of government, Delhi remains absolutely silent. Indian government remains conspicuously tight lipped over the possible bilateral meeting.

Sources in the Bangladesh Ministry of Foreign Affairs who is privy to the exchange of diplomatic messages said there could be multiple reasons, why India continues to be silent over the requests from Bangladesh.

First, India-Bangladesh ties should not be ‘regime-specific’, says Bangladesh Foreign Affairs Adviser Mohmmad Touhid Hossain. Second, India is officially not prepared to make any commitment to the extradition of Hasina.

Third, how will Modi respond to Yunus when he asks him when India will extradite her to stand trial for crimes against humanity responsible for the deaths of over 1400 students and protesters?

The United Nations High Commission for Human Rights, in their 114-page investigation report, says “The brutal response was a calculated and well-coordinated strategy by the former Government [of Awami League] to hold onto power in the face of mass opposition,” UN Human Rights (OHCHR), Chief Volker Türk, said.

“There are reasonable grounds to believe hundreds of extrajudicial killings, extensive arbitrary arrests and detentions, and torture, were carried out with the knowledge, coordination and direction of the political leadership and senior security officials as part of a strategy to suppress the protests.”

The UN fact-finding mission report directly blames Hasina for ordering law enforcement agencies to shoot at protesters with live bullets to neutralize the anti-government street uprising.

Indian media has raised storms on news broadcasts and talk shows that India cannot invite a “stooge” of the United States and China, an unelected leader, etcetera, etcetera. Most importantly, he does not represent the people of Bangladesh which was the first reason for India not responding to Bangladesh’s request for an official meeting.

Bilateral political history of Bangladesh says it differently. At least three military dictators made official visits to Delhi. Like General Ziaur Rahman (1977-1981), General Hussain Muhammad Ershad (1982-1990) and Lt. Gen Moeen U Ahmed (2006-2008), despite not having the people’s mandate.

Indian ruling and opposition parties never objected to the bilateral meetings with three military dictators. The Indian media was not vociferous against their official visits.

The Indian media, also joined by the Indian ruling party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), failed to reconcile with the forcible departure of their all-weather friend Sheikh Hasina, who has taken refuge on the outskirts of Delhi. Jaishankar last week told the Consultative Committee on External Affairs in Delhi that India was aware of the mounting discontent against Hasina leading up to the ouster of her government on 5 August 2024, but could not intervene as it lacked the necessary leverage over the former prime minister.

Admitting tensions between Delhi and Dhaka, especially after India granted refuge to Hasina, the Interim Government in Bangladesh has begun engaging with India, Jaishankar told the Indian lawmakers.

Commenting on the influence of “external actors” in Bangladesh, Jaishankar said he viewed China as a regional “competitor” rather than an “adversary”, writes The Hindu.

Indian External Affairs Minister Jaishankar also told the meeting that SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) was inactive because of Pakistan’s approach and thus India is trying to strengthen BIMSTEC.

In the worst-case scenario, Narendra Modi is expected to drop attending BIMSTEC at the last moment and instead send an emissary on his behalf to attend the summit. Thus, the Modi-Yunus sideline meeting will not happen.

First published in the Stratheia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan on 26 March 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

Rohingya Refugees Return Dim, Dimmer, and Dimmest

SALEEM SAMAD

Three significant developments have occurred in a week which once again brought the much-talked-about Rohingya refugee crisis to the global media.

First, last week United Nations Secretary General António Guterres visited the Rohingya refugees living in squalid camps in south-east Bangladesh. Besides Bangladesh, Rohingyas are languishing in camps in India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. The majoritarian Rohingyas are camped in Bangladesh.

Amid aid cuts, the Secretary-General emphasized that the international community cannot turn its back on the Rohingya crisis. “We cannot accept that the international community forgets about the Rohingyas,” he said, adding that he will “speak loudly” to world leaders that more support is urgently needed.

UN aid efforts in Rohingya camps are in jeopardy following reductions of funds announced by major donors, including the United States and several European nations. Guterres described Cox’s Bazar (where the Rohingya camps are situated) as “ground zero” for the impact of these cuts, warning of a looming humanitarian disaster if immediate action is not taken.

The visiting guest joined with the Rohingya for Iftar (not on the same menu as the refugees). The overwhelming majority of Rohingyas are Muslim, among an estimated 1.2 million refugees. A small number are Hindus and Christians. The Secretary-General could not promise how he would augment food aid and the deadline for the safe and sustainable return of the refugees to Myanmar.

Despite being a poor country, Bangladesh is hosting over one million Rohingya refugees who fled violence in neighboring Myanmar. The largest exodus followed brutal attacks by Tatmadaw (Myanmar security forces) in 2017. A series of dreadful events prompted the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to describe the atrocities as a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”

Myanmar military junta under General Min Aung Hlaing who has ruled Myanmar as the State Administration Council (SAC) chairman since seizing power in the  February 2021 coup d’état overthrowing the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

Hlaing refuses to hold parley with the United Nations officials and does not speak with Bangladesh. Also has imposed restrictions on international NGOs and aid agencies. Such arrogance became visible after the United Nations Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar, led by Marzuki Darusman, said that Min Aung Hlaing, along with four other Generals (Soe Win, Aung Kyaw Zaw, Maung Maung Soe, and Than Oo) should be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity (including genocide) in the International Criminal Court (ICC), at The Hague, The Netherlands.

Recently, the Rakhine state, 36,762 square kilometers (14,194 sq mi) bordering Bangladesh has been overrun by battle-hardened Arakan Army (AA) guerillas. The AA dashed all hopes for the repartition of Rohingyas when the guerilla headquarters issued an official statement extending an olive branch to hold dialogue with Bangladesh authorities but on one condition. The agenda for discussion should not include the return of Bengali Muslims (which means Rohingya).

However, AA urges to continue trade and commerce, border security, and a few other bilateral issues. Bangladesh deliberately did not respond. Dhaka does not recognize ethnic military command to be a legitimate authority to hold official talks. Myanmar military junta and the rebels have similar mindsets identifying the Rohingyas as “Bengali Muslims” who have been blamed for illegally migrating from neighboring Bangladesh since a century ago.

The draconian Citizenship Law of 1982 requires individuals to prove that their ancestors lived in Myanmar before 1823, refuse to recognize Rohingya Muslims as one of the nation’s ethnic groups and delist their language as a national language.

Bangladesh has earlier raised the refugee crisis at several international platforms including the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), the Commonwealth, the United Nations, and other global summits. Despite limited or no contributions for the ‘stateless’ Rohingya, instead the world Muslim countries lauded Bangladesh for providing food and shelter to them.

Unfortunately, several attempts to repatriate the refugees fell flat in 2018 and 2019. Instead, Bangladesh blames the intransigent policy of Suu Kyi’s government, which was ousted by military leaders and placed her under house arrest in February 2021. Academicians and researchers on forced migration and the refugee crisis are convinced that there is no light at the end of the tunnel.

Second, the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) warns of a critical funding shortfall for its emergency response operations in Bangladesh, jeopardizing food assistance for over one million Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.

Without urgent new funding, monthly rations will be halved to US$6 per person, down from US$12.50 per person – just as refugees were preparing to observe Eid, the biggest Muslim festival at the end of Ramadan at the end of this month. To sustain full rations, WFP urgently requires US$15 million for April, and US$81 million until the end of 2025.

In recent months, as conflicts in Rakhine state were at the peak between AA and the junta’s soldiers, fresh waves of Rohingya refugees exceeding 100,000 have crossed into Bangladesh. The continued trickle of Rohingya seeking safety has further contributed to greater strain on already overstretched resources.

Bangladesh’s government for decades refused to recognize the Rohingya as “refugees”, in an excuse that the government has not signed the Convention on the Status of Refugees of 1951.

For a million population with no legal status, no freedom of movement outside the camps, confined inside barbed wires and no sustainable livelihood opportunities, further cuts will exacerbate protection and security risks, says the UN agency.

The vulnerability is likely to heighten risks of exploitation, trafficking, prostitution, and domestic violence among women and girls. Children are expected to drop out of learning schools and be forced into child labor. There will be a spike in child brides as families resort to desperate measures to survive on meager rations.

Third, on the day when Fortify Rights released its 78-page research report, “I May Be Killed Any Moment: Killings, Abductions, Torture, and Other Serious Violations by Rohingya Militant Groups in Bangladesh” in Dhaka, the special security forces nabbed the Islamic jihadist Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) supremo Ataullah Abu Ammar Jununi, commonly known as Ataullah near the capital Dhaka on 18 March without a firefight.

Fortify Rights, an international human rights investigation NGO, recommends that the Government of Bangladesh and international justice mechanisms – including the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar and the ICC – investigate Rohingya militant organizations operational in the refugee camps in Bangladesh and prosecute those responsible for war crimes.

Such specific Intel in capturing Ataullah must have been shared by Pakistan’s military establishment in Rawalpindi. International media has been blaming Pakistan’s spy agency ISI for recruitment, training and funding for ARSA.

Indian security agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) has kept ARSA under strict surveillance. Monitoring their leader’s sleeper cell, monetary exchanges, and their covert activities.

ARSA first came into the limelight in August 2017 after the jihadist overran several Myanmar’s Border Guards Forces outposts along Bangladesh-Myanmar international borders. After the firefight, ARSA fell back to Bangladesh’s no-man’s-land, which is covered by hill forests and scores of streams.

Earlier, Bangladesh, Myanmar and India refused to accept ARSA as a jihadist outfit. The militant group was described as ‘Rohingya Muslim vigilantes’ with a limited ordinance and disorganized, therefore nothing to be worried about was in their mind.

ARSA’s attacks sparked Tatmadaw’s (Myanmar military) to commit a brutal genocidal campaign against Rohingya Muslims. The troops torched hundreds of villages and went on a rampage for months despite international calls to cease brutality against the Rohingyas.

The Naypyidaw labeled ARSA as an “extremist Bengali terrorists, also Rohingya Muslim terrorists,” warning that its goal is to establish an Islamic state in the Rakhine state. Such an ambitious objective will be difficult to implement in a Buddhist-majority region.

Myanmar blames Pakistan’s dreaded Pakistan’s spy agency ISI for its share in mentoring the jihadist outfit. Their theory that ARSA has been raised, funded, and provides logistics and indoctrination was masterminded by ISI and is also believed by both Bangladesh and India.

Simultaneously, India became worried about the presence of the jihadist outfit at the border of Bangladesh-Myanmar-India. The skirmish with Myanmar troops has also raised the eyebrows of Bangladesh and expressed alarm on the visible presence of ARSA in its territory.

The ARSA militants were mostly recruited from the Rohingya refugees. It was not to anybody’s surprise that the leadership was Pakistan-born Saudi émigrés. They raise funds mostly from Rohingyas living in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Several years ago, in a rare interview with an international media, Ataullah, chief of ARSA said that their objective would be “open war” and “continued [armed] resistance” against the Myanmar government until “citizenship rights were reinstated” of Rohingyas in Myanmar.

The jihadist leader denied having links to the Islamic State or ISIS in a video and said he turned his back on support from Pakistan-based jihadists. The Bangladesh security agencies were skeptical of his claim.

A security expert in Bangladesh explains that ARSA has ideological differences from other terror outfits in the region and has reason to distance itself from the transnational jihadist network.

ARSA operatives are responsible for widespread abduction, extortions, tortures and executions of suspects. The crimes are committed to collect funds for local operations in the world’s largest Rohingya camps, says Fortify Rights in their latest report.

Cash-starved Al Yakin, the volunteer group of ARSA is mostly responsible for gang war in the refugee camps to establish dominance over other non-militant groups in the sprawling camps.

Often breaking news from Rohingya refugee camps of robbers, dacoits, and armed gangs killed in encounters by anti-crime forces – the slain victims are radicalized Rohingya militants.

Fortify Rights urges that Bangladesh should hold the Rohingya militants accountable for war crimes. Bangladesh’s Interim Government should cooperate with international justice mechanisms to investigate crimes and bring potential war criminals to justice.

Donor governments should work with Bangladesh to redouble services for Rohingya at risk, including protective spaces and third-country resettlement, said Fortify Rights.

In an interview that aired on 4 March 2025, the head of Bangladesh Interim Government, Prof Muhammad Yunus, spoke about violence in the refugee camps, saying: “There is lots of violence, lots of drugs, lots of paramilitary activities inside the camps.”

“War crimes are usually committed within the immediate theater of armed conflict but, in this case, specific crimes in Bangladesh are directly connected to the war in Myanmar and constitute war crimes,” says John Quinley, Director at Fortify Rights.

Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh have suffered years of violence and killings at the hands of Rohingya militant groups. Reported killings by camp-based militants numbered 22 in 2021, 42 in 2022, 90 in 2023, and at least 65 in 2024.

The majority of the killings by Rohingya militants documented by Fortify Rights occurred with impunity in the camps, creating a climate of fear for all camp residents, said Fortify Rights.

ARSA and a rival Islamist militant outfit, the Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) are engaged in Myanmar’s internal armed conflict. They are both fighting with the Myanmar junta and against the Arakan Army, with very little impact militarily.

To reinforce their armed campaigns inside Myanmar, ARSA, and RSO have abducted refugees in Bangladesh and forced them to fight in Myanmar. Such acts are grave violations of the laws of war and should be investigated as possible war crimes.

The ICC has already established jurisdiction and opened an investigation into cross-border atrocity crimes occurring against Rohingya in both Bangladesh and Myanmar. This should include crimes committed by ARSA and similar groups, said Fortify Rights.

In 2019, the British-born ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Ahmad Khan at the time said the court was “aware of a number of acts of violence allegedly committed by ARSA,” noting that the allegations would be kept “under review.”

First published in the Stratheia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan on 23 March 2025 

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

Bangladesh Denies India Thwarts Pakistan’s Engineered Coup!

SALEEM SAMAD

An Indian news portal, Swarajya, published an exclusive article with the headline “India Helped Thwart a Coup Against Bangladesh Army Chief by Pro-Pak Islamist Generals,” written by journalist Jaideep Mazumdar. Swarajya periodical was launched in 1956. The media boasts of ethical clarity, intellectual honesty, and the ability to speak truth to power, accentuating his reputation as a bold journalist.

The question is how ethical and honest the article carries on conspiracy to a coup plot by Pakistan which is fortunately unearthed by Indian hawks at the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), a spy agency that claims to have shared encrypted Intel to alert Bangladesh armed forces headquarters. There are several issues which need to be put on the table. First, why would Pakistan’s dreaded spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) go for a half-baked coup plot, which eventually did not see the light of day?

Second, why would Bangladesh’s military headquarters in the capital Dhaka take the crucial Indian military information seriously, when nearly 1400 students and protesters were shot and killed during the July-August revolution to topple the autocrat Sheikh Hasina and India and Indian media remained tight-lipped?

Let’s presume that the plot was successful. Millions of students and protesters would pour into the streets of Bangladesh protesting the illegal coup d’état, which goes against the spirit of the Monsoon Revolution. The nation would plunge into a bloody civil war. Bangladesh Army is divided into several regional commanders based in 31 cantonments distributed among the infantry, artillery, armored corps, and other vital units.

Mazumdar, who writes on Indian current affairs and India’s neighbors does not know it will be very difficult to muster the allegiance of 10 regional commanders to join the mutiny, which they will be able to understand in an hour that the plot would not serve their purpose. To stay in power, the mutineers will have to slaughter thousands of protesters in the streets and arrest tens of thousands, which will turn into a massive headache for the soldiers to contain them in the long run.

The mutineers know that the people do not listen to state broadcast radio. It will be difficult to ventilate their crucial messages. The alternative would be to create a social media channel to keep their propaganda kicking. As Mazumdar writes the coup engineered by Pakistan military establishment will usher in pro-Pakistan elements in power with the moral support of the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Isami.

Several senior retired officers, who have privy to military affairs have confided that the story by Mazumdar is fictitious and has several flaws in information of name, ranks, and position. Most importantly the alleged plotter Lieutenant General Muhammad Faizur Rahman, who was supposed to replace the current COAS is still in service.

The other half a dozen Generals who reportedly supported Rahman are still in service and have been reassigned to new positions, according to retired officers. Well, Jamaat-e-Islami has yet to apologize for supporting and abetting the marauding Pakistan military during the liberation war in 1971. The Jamaat-e-Islami youths were recruited to raise an Islamic militia and Al Badr, a secret death squad responsible for abduction and execution without mercy.

They were trained and also provided weapons and logistics to hunt and eliminate suspected Mukti Bahini guerillas and independence sympathizers. The victims were mostly Hindus.

Most political analysts argue that the Jamaat will not make such a suicidal decision, which will destroy their political career. They did make a political blunder in 1971 and took four decades to stand on their feet. Next time if the Islamist party supports an illegal military junta, the party will opt for self-destruction.

Salauddin Babar, editor of pro-Jamaat newspaper Dainik Naya Diganta says Jamaat-e-Islami is a political party and has learned to keep their heads above the water during the Awami League government of Sheikh Hasina’s repressive regimes.

Thousands of the party leaders and members had been in prison on charges of Islamic terrorism and destabilizing the country. Jamaat has been able to stand firm on their political indoctrination. Babar believes that Jamaat will never take a shortcut to power on a piggy-back of the military. Instead, they would demand the mutineers to hold a free and fair inclusive election. This will irk the plotters.

Then who is the alternative Islamist party? Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh is a madrassa-based platform that has millions of students and followers in small cities and rural areas. The organization opposes Deoband’s Islamic theology of liberalism, and respect for others’ religious practices, culture, and tradition.

The military leaders will have to rely on the support of Hefazat-e-Islam. The armed militia will eventually turn the country into Talibanism. Which will be chaotic and would be difficult for the rogue military to bridle them.

The tide has turned around. India as a victorious army in 1971 was a catalyst in the historic surrender of the marauding Pakistan military to protect the sovereignty and integrity of the eastern province. The Indians had fondled Bangladesh since its independence. It cannot be ignored that India is the largest neighbor and its borders are wrapped around Bangladesh.

Pakistan, to avenge the humiliating defeat is expected to fiddle Bangladesh which was not friendly with Islamabad. The country’s three regimes, out of five were not hostile to Pakistan. Islamabad should be contended with the diplomatic relations. Nobel laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus extended warm hearts to Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif when the two met at a summit in Cairo. The meeting turned the relations from cold to warm.

After the Mujib-Bhutto official meetup in February 1974, the relations apparently became warm. When Mujib attended the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit in Lahore, Pakistan and later Bhutto paid an official visit to Bangladesh and planted a tree sapling at the National Martyrs Memorial for those killed during the brutal birth of Bangladesh. Everything went well.

Trade and commerce between the two countries resumed and hatred on both sides significantly thawed. Meanwhile, scores of Pakistani industrialists and business entrepreneurs have relocated their textile factories in Bangladesh since 2000, according to Express Tribune newspaper. The textile products were destined for European and American markets.

The production by Pakistan industrialists in Bangladesh will further multiply when the Trump administration enforces a trade embargo with China. Export analysts say the Bangladesh market for ready-made garments (RMG) will be able to make a dent in garments sold to Walmart, Amazon, Gap, Levi Strauss, Macy’s, Nike and several other giant clothes retailers in the United States.

Dr Imtiaz Ahmed, a professor at Dhaka University and a political scientist said Pakistan will not jeopardize such an ongoing opportunity which will lead to the Trump administration’s imposing trade sanctions on a military administration in Bangladesh after the takeover of the country through an unconstitutional method.

Most importantly, the Bangladesh Army is trained in defensive combat tactics and crowd control. Bangladesh has negative threats of war from its neighbors (India and Myanmar). The military is trained to be deployed in the United Nations peacekeeping missions. Several contingents are readied to be deployed in several war-torn countries in Africa and Haiti, in the Caribbean.

Bangladesh is a significant contributor to UN peacekeeping missions, having deployed over 160,000 peacekeepers to 54 missions in 40 countries, with 6,802 currently deployed in 9 missions.

A foot soldier’s lifetime income comes from peacekeeping. The soldier invests in housing, buying arable lands, and setting up trading stores in their hometown. With military wages and benefits, it is not possible to live a life free from poverty.

If the peacekeeping mission is jeopardized, the soldiers will revolt against their commanding officers and there is the worst possibility that they may take extreme measures, which occurred on 7th November 1975. The soldiers will disobey the commands of their officers performing martial law duties. In such situation, the nation will plunge into a long-drawn civil war.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which advocates Hindutva means ‘Hindu-ness’. BJP’s inherent political ideology asserts that Hindu nationalism as an Indian national identity is not at all happy that their all-weather friend Sheikh Hasina has been ousted and sent to India to live in exile.

The South Block in New Delhi could not ascertain that the United States, Great Britain and Schengen (European Union) visas would be denied and stamped visas would be revoked.

For now, Delhi had taken a rat in their throat, which they cannot swallow nor vomit. They are in limbo with their guest Hasina. Admitted a senior Indian diplomat based in Dhaka.

Muhammad Yunus, the present head of government has reiterated that Bangladesh wants to have good relations with India. Possibly BJP explicitly does not believe and South Block has some reservations about improving bilateral relations.

For the time being, Bangladesh and India have developed love-and-hate relations. Both countries cannot avoid it but have lots of distrust, suspicion, and pessimism.

First published in the Stratheia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan, 18 March 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

Bangladesh Election Schedule

SALEEM SAMAD

The inherent weaknesses of Nobel laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus’s interim government has prompted Chief of Army Staff, General Waker-Uz-Zaman, to call for an elected government. His statement on 24 February made it clear to the government, political parties, and student leaders responsible for waging the July-August Monsoon Revolution last year, which ousted Sheikh Hasina’s autocratic rule, that 18 months is enough time to hold a general election.

Prof Yunus has announced that the election could be held in December this year. However, his Press Secretary, Shafiq ul Alam, said it could be held either in December or January 2026. The election date to parliament will be announced at the decision of the Election Commission, which is not an independent body. Earlier, Yunus has repeatedly said that the elections will be held only after reforms of crucial state institutions take place to ensure democracy, accountability, and transparency of the government and the officials.

The General repeated twice that the election should be free, fair and inclusive. The questions that come to mind are: What does he mean by inclusivity? Did he mean that no political parties should be left out from contesting the parliamentary elections?

On the other hand, the students have been agitating that Sheikh Hasina led Awami League should be banned and Yunus should not invite the Jatiya Party to any official dialogue.

aThe East Pakistan Awami Muslim League is the oldest party and was born only a few years after the birth of Pakistan. The founders of the party, who defected from the Muslim League in a bid to accommodate others, dropped “Muslim” and formed the Awami League in 1955.

Where as, Jatiya Party, a king’s party emerged after General Husain Muhammad Ershad in a bloodless coup in 1981 formed his party to consolidate his power. In 1990, he was overthrown after months of violent street protests by the students.

His party indeed was a “loyal opposition” during the 15 years rule of Hasina. The honeymoon period of the Jatiya Party abruptly ended when the Awami League regime collapsed and Hasina fled to India last August.

The back-scratching has prompted the leaders of the student revolution to say no to the Jatiya Party – a loud and clear message that they should not be in politics in future.

The two military juntas took power and formed king’s parties – one was the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which ruled the country for the fourth consecutive term. The second was the Jatiya Party. General Ershad’s party ruled for nine years until his regime collapsed in 1990.

BNP was formed when military dictator General Zia ur Rahman, a liberation war decorated officer, took power in the vacuum when independence hero Sheikh Mujib ur Rahman was assassinated in August 1975 by a dozen young military officers without a political vision to steer the country through a crisis.

General Rahman took over the helms of affairs of the country, after a soldier’s mutiny in less than three months of the previous military putsch. Despite having a political vision, for unknown reasons, he rehabilitated those politicians who opposed the independence of Bangladesh in crucial positions.

He also rehabilitated scores of Bangla-speaking military officers who fought alongside the Pakistan Army against the Mukti Bahini guerillas and Indian troops during the bloody war in 1971 and dodged the surrender ceremony of Pakistan armed forces. Also, most of the Bangla-speaking military officers were recruited in senior positions in the police services.

In a speech, last week, commemorating the fallen officers of the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) revolt 17 years ago, General Waqar-uz-Zaman has said, ‘We are thinking that we will finish the work quickly and take the army back to the cantonment.””We have to be patient. Work with professionalism. Until an elected government comes, we have to do this with patience,” he furthermore stated.

Many have remarked that the COAS has expressed discomfort against the Yunus government when the situation of law and order reached an alarming level.

The crime situation in Bangladesh is such that there are thefts, robberies and dacoities committed in broad daylight causing widespread panic among the citizenry.The Home Affairs Advisor, Lt. General Jahangir Alam Chowdhury, called a press conference at his house at 3 am and blamed the Awami League for the law and order situation. He said, “Awami League is funnelling ill-gotten money to desperate criminals.”

Political and administrative circles believe that the comments of the army chief regarding the alarming rise of crime amid the demand for the resignation of the home adviser, and his accountability have given the allegation of failure of the government.

Meanwhile, Indian Nobel laureate Prof Amartya Sen, who was born in Bangladesh and studied in a school in Dhaka in an interview with the Indian official news agency Press Trust of India (PTI) a few days ago praised the Bangladeshi Army for its restraint in not attempting to establish military rule, as has happened in many other countries.

Dr Sen said “Yunus is an old friend. I know he is highly capable and, in many ways, a remarkable human being. He has made strong statements about Bangladesh’s secularism and democratic commitment.”

In many third-world countries, the military has always been ambitious to take over power and overthrow a legitimate government, Bangladesh Army seems to behave very rationally.

Bangladesh military officers are refused deployment in United Nations Peacekeeping and also provided visit visas to the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia and European countries for track record on human rights abuse. That is one of the reasons that General Zaman has advised his troops deployed for the anti-crime operation so-called “Devil Hunt” to avoid excessive force and shoot to kill suspects.

On the other hand, the mainstream political parties Bangladesh BNP and Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami have been demanding an early election, a month after Yunus took charge of the government in August last year. Dr Yunus, however, urged the political leaders to hold their patience until the crucial reforms of the election commission, judiciary, civil administration, constitution, media, anti-corruption, police administration and others are implemented.

The Chief Adviser of the Interim Government aims for the reforms in a bid to develop a state system based on public ownership, accountability, and welfare. The political parties negotiating with the government have in the back of their mind the fact that the Yunus administration does not have the legitimacy to implement the reforms in the absence of a parliament. They are saying in closed-door party meetings that the political parties would be empowered to implement the reforms. Without the reforms, most observers and political think tanks believe that the political parties will take the country back to square one when they refuse to have the reforms in place.

Reforms will bring about more accountability and transparency of elected public representatives, which the politicians will not agree to in any case. In addition, the independence of the judiciary, and civil and police administration will jeopardize their authority over their constitution.

This is not the first time that the political and administrative reforms have been taken seriously. In 1990, days after the downfall of the military dictator, the student leaders were able to convince the mainstream opposition parties, the Awami League, BNP and Left coalition leaders to sign a pledge that they would bring about reforms of the government institutions.

Unfortunately, both the Awami League and BNP ruled the country several times. They deliberately ignored the reforms, leading to politicization of police, civil services, judiciary, election commission and other governmental institutions to manipulate in favor of the politicians and their henchmen. Therefore, political historian Mohiuddin Ahmed predicts that hundreds of pages of reform documents would be thrown out of the windows of the iconic massive parliament building designed by Louis Kahn, a celebrated visionary architect.

First published in the Stratheia Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan on 4 March 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

UN Probe Accuses Hasina Regime of Crimes Against Humanity

 

Street Grafitti by students of Monsoon Revolution. Photo Copyright @OHCHR

SALEEM SAMAD

Weeks before former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled to India, who is now living in exile somewhere in Delhi, the country erupted in anti-government street protests that turned violent last year. Now the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) in a damning report points fingers at the crackdown by security forces and it is said to have committed human rights violations with impunity.

The brutal July-August crackdown by the Hasina regime was tantamount to crimes against humanity as stated by the former ruling party, Awami League, the security and intelligence agencies together systematically engaged in such violations against protesters of Monsoon Revolution, which ousted the 15-year-old autocratic rule of Hasina.

“To cling on to power, the former Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League government with all its political apparatus – including security and intelligence forces – used systematic and brutal violence against student-led mass protests in July-August last year,”. The UN Human Rights Office report is based on credible testimonies from senior officials and other evidence such as serious human rights violations by security forces during the protests, including extrajudicial killings, excessive use of force causing serious injuries to thousands, mass arbitrary arrests and detentions, and torture and other mistreatments.

The testimonies and evidence gathered by the UN fact-finding mission painted a disturbing picture of rampant state violence and targeted killings, which are among the most serious violations of human rights, and which may also constitute international crimes.

Sources have verified the deaths reported, the UN report estimates that 1,400 people, around 12 per cent of those were children, may have been killed between 1 July and 15 August (45 days) last year, and over 13,500 were injured, the vast majority of whom were shot by Bangladesh’s security forces. Bangladesh Police also reported that 44 of its members were killed.

The fact-finding report found evidence to prove that Hasina oversaw the July protest killings!!! The report also states that former senior officials directly involved in handling the protests and other inside sources described how Hasina and other senior officials directed and oversaw a countrywide large-scale crackdown from a command center, in which security and intelligence forces shot and killed protesters or arbitrarily arrested and tortured them.

The fugitive home minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal deployed the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) as a strike force and even specifically demanded the deployment of more helicopters to scare protesters in the way that the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) had used them, the report elaborated.

“The testimonies and evidence we gathered paint a disturbing picture of rampant state violence and targeted killings, which are amongst the most serious violations of human rights, and which may also constitute international crimes. Accountability and justice are essential for national healing and for the future of Bangladesh,” said UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk at a press conference in Geneva on 12th February.

“The brutal response was a calculated and well-coordinated strategy by the former government to hold onto power in the face of mass opposition,” said Türk. At the request of Chief Adviser Prof Mohammed Yunus, the UN Human Rights Office dispatched a team to Bangladesh in September, including human rights investigators, a forensics physician, and a weapons expert, to conduct an independent and impartial fact-finding into the deadly events.

These violations raise concerns under international criminal law, warranting further investigations to determine whether they amount to crimes against humanity, torture as a stand-alone crime, or serious violations under domestic law, according to the report. It found patterns of security forces deliberately and impermissibly killing or maiming protesters, including incidents where people were shot at a close range.

Violations during the protests included evidence of violence incitement by armed Awami League supporters, excessive use of force by Police, RAB, and BGB — resulting in extrajudicial killings — along the Army’s involvement in the use of excessive force.

The report also documents cases in which security forces denied or obstructed critical medical care for injured protesters, interrogated patients and collected their fingerprints in hospitals, intimidated medical personnel, and seized hospital CCTV footage without due process, in an apparent effort to identify protesters and to conceal evidence of the extent of violence carried out by state forces.

The RAB should be disbanded, and the roles of the BGB and the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), a military spy agency, must be confined to their original mandates. It has been advised that independent commissions must be created to investigate police violations and establish similar accountability and justice mechanisms for the Bangladesh Armed Forces and BGB.

The UN report recommends reforming the security and justice sectors, abolishing a host of repressive laws and institutions designed to stifle civic and political dissent and implement broader changes to the political system and economic governance.

The most crucial observation of the UN probe report strongly recommended that the Bangladesh authorities should refrain from nominating military or police personnel for peacekeeping missions who have served with the RAB, DGFI, or Dhaka Metropolitan Police Detective Branch, or in BGB battalions deployed to the 2024 protests or other force-suppressed protests until a human rights screening mechanism is established.

The report did not hesitate to document the aftermath of the protests, and the report also found police officers being revengefully targeted, Awami League members, and the police were perceived to be aligned with the Awami League, as well as some journalists presumed to be affiliated with Hasina’s regime.

Former Ambassador Humayun Kabir, chairman of Bangladesh Enterprise Institute, an influential think-tank when approached to comment on what is going to happen next, said now it is clear that Hasina is likely not to be tried in Bangladesh.

The UN fact-finding report is an authenticated investigative document which would be produced at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, The Netherlands.

The ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan after at a parley with Nobel laureate Prof Yunus has agreed to investigate and start a due process for the trial of Hasina for crimes against humanity. Once the ICC agrees to put Hasina on the docks to face crimes she has committed, The Hague court will seek her extradition from India, where she has been living in exile since 5 August.

It will surely be a severe diplomatic embarrassment for the bigwigs at New Delhi’s South Block where they do not have enough legal reasons to scuttle her extradition to The Hague.

On the other hand, despite a formal request by Bangladesh’s Foreign Ministry through diplomatic channels, Delhi has remained silent, except for the spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs who has acknowledged receiving the ‘note verbale’ from Dhaka of her extradition.

Well, regarding the deportation of Hasina to Bangladesh, India has several arguments for not sending her to stand trial at the International Crimes Tribunal in Dhaka. But giving excuses to the ICC will be difficult for India.

First published in the Stratheia, a Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan on 16 February 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad

Growing Pressure on Dr. Yunus for Early Elections

SALEEM SAMAD

When Sheikh Hasina came to power, the new generation (Gen Z) had not seen free, fair, and inclusive elections since 2008. Election observers described the parliament elections under her 15-year autocratic regime as fraud, and the poll results were cropped.

The international media had widely reported how elections in Bangladesh in 2014, 2018, and 2024 were held under the cover of darkness, keeping thousands of opposition leaders and members in prison.

The rights organizations repeatedly made loud noise, but Hasina ignored their calls to hold free and fair elections. Instead, she was beating African drums that the country belongs to her father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was ordained as the architect of Bangladesh’s independence signalling she has the right the govern with an iron hand.

Amid cheering crowds, she often boasted that her father had made the country independent and was known as Bangabandhu (Friend of Bangladesh). Otherwise, she explained, the nation would have been subjugated by Pakistan’s military establishment, making them second-class citizens.

Nobel laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus took charge of an Interim Government backed by defiant student leaders and the military after they forced the Iron Lady (Hasina) to abdicate her power and flee to India, where she is living in exile.

The political parties except the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami have demanded an election at the soonest, indicating before the end of this year. Yunus charted a path to reforms to establish pluralism, democracy, and human rights, he announced in an address to the nation that several commissions suggested reforms to key state organs.

He conveyed to the political leaders that the elections would be held only after the reforms on Electoral System, Constitution, Public Administration, Judiciary, Financial Institutions, Media, Police Administration, and Anti-Corruption were made effective. The political parties and civil society welcomed his initiative.

When military dictator General Muhammad Ershad was ousted by students backed by the military in 1990, the mainstream opposition parties signed an election pledge prepared by the student leaders. The opposition leaders promised to implement the reforms in key state organs.

Sheikh Hasina, Khaleda Zia, and the Left Alliance jointly signed a tripartite political commitment that they will implement the reforms after winning the elections. Unfortunately, both the Begums went to power again and again but they deliberately avoided implementing the pro-people pledge.

After decades of bad governance, poor accountability and transparency, Yunus is determined to see a new Bangladesh, which adheres to the principles of international covenants to put the country at a respectable height on the world stage.

The reforms are supposed to guarantee democracy, pluralism, accountability, transparency, independence of the judiciary, independent election commission, freedom of expression, press freedom, and human rights. He has reiterated that the elections will be held once the reforms have taken off the ground zero.

Most political scientists and think tanks believe that the political parties would agree not to disagree. Later the politicians, when elected, the painstakingly homework for reforms would be binned. For more than five decades the political parties that ruled the nation were intolerant and arrogant. At times reacted very violently.

The politicians publicly flouted the rule of law, punished the journalists for exposing their corruption, and ignored the accountability of elected representatives of public offices. They often coerced police and judiciary to ensure that their blue-eyed boys were kept out of prison for extortion from traders and protection money from industrialists, while their rivals were severely punished and blocked from politics.

The visible challenges in front of Yunus are acting as a stumbling block in the accountability of bureaucracy, judiciary and law and order situation. The police are unable to restore lawlessness and control price hikes in kitchen markets.

There is no guarantee clause to be signed by politicians, that the reforms should be taken into cognizance in “good faith” by the ‘untamed’ political parties. Yunus told in an interview with an editor of a Bangladesh newspaper that the leaders of the political parties when they held parleys with him were polite and humble.

However, when they spoke to the journalists, they gave a different statement which they did not put on the table of discussion with the Chief Adviser of the Interim Government. It is strange but it is a fact, he told the editor.

The recent spree of vandalism and demolition of the Bangabandhu Museum, the former residence of the first President of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman on 5 February. Students went berserk in several cities and towns in the looting and arson of Awami League senior leaders, who were deemed icons of accomplices to autocratic Hasina’s misrule.

The Chief Adviser in a tone of warning that certain groups are pushing the nation into anarchy and lawlessness. The inventor of micro-credit Prof Yunus calls on all citizens “to immediately restore complete law and order and to ensure there will be no further attacks on properties” associated with the family of the ousted Sheikh Hasina and politicians of the fascist Awami League party or against any citizen on any pretext.

He, however, said the outrage has sparked from her (Hasina) refuge in New Delhi, and from there she continues to mobilize her militants to hamper Bangladesh’s recovery from years of abuse under her 15-year rule.

If any attempt is made to destabilize the country through any kind of provocative activities, law enforcement agencies will immediately take strict action against anyone acting to create chaos and anarchy, which includes the destruction of property. The government will bring the responsible individuals and groups to justice, he stated.

While the vandalism and looting, the law enforcement agencies were playing as silent spectators when the mobs were rioting. Several civil society, rights, and citizens groups strongly condemned the vandalism, arson, and looting of family members of Hasina and Awami League leaders.

Celebrated feminist Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen, who lives in exile in India, has called the demolition of Sheikh Mujib’s residence an act of “Islamic terrorists”.

The Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer Dr Shafiqur Rahman said “If the ongoing madness does not stop, Bangladesh will be heading towards civil war.” While, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) said in a statement that they will hold talks with Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus as soon as possible to express their concern over the country’s “deteriorating” law and order situation, especially the demolition of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s residence in Dhaka.

They fear that these attacks and vandalism in the last two days could pose a serious threat to national stability and disrupt the upcoming national election, a BNP statement said. It is understood that on the issue of appalling law and order status, the political parties will press Yunus to hold elections in the coming winter.

Most political analysts argue that Yunus may not agree to their demand for an early election, unless the reforms get tacit approval from all political parties, except for the former ruling party Awami League. Most of the like-minded political parties, except the Islamist parties, are lisping the same jargon as the BNP’s political agenda of early election.

Will an election roadmap neutralize the political crisis? Writer and researcher on political history Mohiuddin Ahmad does not believe that the situation will improve; rather, it may worsen.

Most political parties have extended their support to the Interim Government led by Prof Yunus. However, they argue that in the last six months, the government has failed in various areas, including controlling the price of daily essentials and improving the law and order situation.

As a result, there are doubts about their ability to control any situation in the country. The last two days of vandalism have added to the crisis of confidence. Ahmad remarked that if the government announces an election roadmap, there will be a further crisis when local party leaders clash with rivals in electioneering.

The government and mainstream political parties should focus on the country’s image and stability. Because if there is no stability, everything including democracy and elections will suffer, said political scientist Professor Mahbub Ullah to BBC Bangla Service.

First published in the Stratheia, Policy Journal, Islamabad, Pakistan, 9 February 2025

Saleem Samad is an award-winning independent journalist based in Bangladesh. A media rights defender with the Reporters Without Borders (@RSF_inter). Recipient of Ashoka Fellowship and Hellman-Hammett Award. He could be reached at saleemsamad@hotmail.com; Twitter (X): @saleemsamad