Amnesty International Report 1996 - Bangladesh

Dozens of prisoners of conscience were held without charge or trial under special legislation. Torture was widespread and led to at least seven deaths in custody. At least nine people were extrajudicially executed. The scope of the death penalty was extended. At least three people were sentenced to death but no executions were reported. Unlawful "trials" of women by village councils continued. Opposition parties, led by the Awami League, continued to demand the resignation of the government of Prime Minister Khaleda Zia and fresh elections under a neutral caretaker government. However, the government made no concessions. The opposition called a series of protest strikes, many of which became violent. Over a dozen political leaders were killed and hundreds of people were injured in clashes between protesters and the security forces, and in clashes between different political parties. The seats of 142 opposition parliamentarians who had resigned in December 1994 were formally declared vacant in July; the Election Commission announced that elections would take place in February 1996. In the Chittagong Hill Tracts, talks between the government and tribal representatives failed to bring a political solution to the long-standing conflict between non-Bengali tribal inhabitants and the government, but the cease-fire was periodically extended. The repatriation of some 50,000 tribal refugees living in camps in India was not restarted. The government rejected demands by the tribal population that their repatriation should be placed under international supervision. In September Myanmar agreed to the repatriation of the remaining 57,000 Muslim refugees in Bangladesh. In 1992 some 260,000 Burmese Muslims had entered Bangladesh, but their repatriation, which began in September 1992, had repeatedly stalled. Scores of people, dozens of whom were prisoners of conscience, were held under the Special Powers Act (SPA) which permits detention without charge or trial for an indefinite period. As in earlier years, the High Court declared the vast majority of SPA detention orders to have been unlawful. For example, Farhad Mazhar, editor of the magazine Chinta, was detained on 30 July for 120 days because he had written an article about the suppression of a revolt by the paramilitary Ansars in December 1994. The Dhaka High Court declared the detention order to be unlawful in August and he was released. Five political activists – Mostafa Farook, Abul Hossain, Shafiqul Islam, Moteleb Hossain and Manek – were arrested after a strike in March and detained under the SPA for alleged "anti-state activities" and on further grounds not disclosed "in the public interest". Their detention for one month was extended by another three months in April. They were released in May when the authorities failed to prove the lawfulness of the orders for their detention. Feminist author Taslima Nasrin, charged with outraging religious sentiments, left the country after obtaining bail in August 1994 (see Amnesty International Report 1995). Efforts to have her case quashed failed but her trial had not started by the end of the year. The trials of four editors of the newspaper Janakantha on similar charges (see Amnesty International Report 1995) had not concluded by the end of the year. In the Chittagong Hill Tracts, there were continuing reports of ill-treatment, harassment and arbitrary detention of tribal people with the acquiescence or active participation of the police. In March a demonstration of tribal students in Bandarban was stopped by a group of non-tribal settlers who then looted and burned down the homes of some 300 tribal families. Police reportedly stood by without attempting to protect the lives and property of tribal people. During the incident, 12 police officers beat and injured a Buddhist monk, Waiyzo Marma, his wife and a visitor when he denied sheltering tribal activists. Later that day, 22 tribal students, including a 15-year-old girl, were arrested and allegedly beaten. Eight were released on bail within three weeks but four were held for five months before obtaining bail. Torture and ill-treatment in police custody and in jails were widespread. Torture led to at least seven deaths in police and judicial custody. In August, 14-year-old Yasmin Akhter died after three police officers in Dinajpur had reportedly raped and injured her. They had reportedly given her a lift in a police van and later dropped her dead body by the roadside. Police claimed she had died when she jumped from the van. Following public protests about the attempted cover-up, three police officers were suspended and charged. A judicial inquiry submitted its report to the government in October but it was not made public. Prison regulations permit the imposition of iron bar fetters on prisoners and detainees in specific circumstances. Although they should not be applied to people held in preventive detention, Badshan Mian, who was arrested in June and held under the SPA in Khulna District Jail, was reported to be held continuously in fetters. Disproportionate use of force by police against demonstrators continued to be reported. In February, three press photographers were injured by police when they attempted to take photographs of police beating students; photographer Emran Hussain of the Daily Star reportedly suffered two broken vertebrae when police threw him to the ground and hit him with clubs. No official investigation into this incident was apparently undertaken. At least nine people were reportedly extrajudicially executed. In August, seven people were killed when police fired at peaceful protesters in Dinajpur. A human rights group investigating the incident said that the dead included a 10-year-old boy. Few perpetrators of human rights violations were brought to justice. An inquiry into the possible extrajudicial execution of between 12 and 20 tribal people in Naniarchar in November 1993 (see Amnesty International Reports 1994 and 1995) was apparently completed, but no report had been published by the end of the year. A constable was suspended and charged with the attempted rape of a housewife in Savar in July; it was not known if the trial had started by the end of the year. In July the death penalty was extended to several offences against women and children, including kidnapping and trafficking. Women's organizations protested against the bill; they argued that the death penalty was abhorrent and itself a violation of human rights. At least three people were sentenced to death, all of them for murder. In September a woman was sentenced to death in Rangpur; she was found guilty of having murdered her daughter in order to sell her organs. No executions were known to have been carried out during the year. Women continued to be subjected to unlawful "trials" and cruel, inhuman and degrading punishments by village mediation councils or salish. The government failed to put an end to such abuses. Nasima Khatton was "tried" by a salish for unlawful sexual intercourse, four months after the birth of her illegitimate child. She was tied to a tree in the village of Dattanalai and publicly flogged in August. Police raided the village after the incident was reported in the local press, but did not arrest any of the participants in the salish. The appeal by nine participants in a salish, who were sentenced to seven years' imprisonment in Moulvibazar in 1994 for having unlawfully condemned a couple to death by stoning, was still pending at the end of the year (see Amnesty International Report 1995). Amnesty International repeatedly urged the government to release prisoners of conscience immediately and unconditionally and to drop the charges against Taslima Nasrin and the Janakantha journalists. The organization received no reply. Prime Minister Khaleda Zia was reported in the press in July as saying that Amnesty International's 1994 report on the lack of protection given to women (Bangladesh: Fundamental rights of women violated with virtual impunity), and similar reports in the news media, were often baseless and that the incidents of women unlawfully sentenced by salish had decreased. She also publicly stated that the SPA was "necessary for the country but not used". Amnesty International delegates wishing to visit Bangladesh in July were denied visas.