DHAKA: A fact-finding team from the UN will visit Bangladesh next week to investigate “atrocities” committed during the unrest that toppled Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina earlier this month, the country’s interim government said on Thursday.
Student protests that began peacefully in early July soon turned violent when Hasina’s followers and security forces clashed with demonstrators and cracked down on rallies, leaving at least 300 people dead and thousands injured. Authorities also arrested more than 11,000 people, mostly student activists.
The violent uprising that forced Bangladesh’s longest-serving premier to resign and flee the country brought political transition, with Nobel-winning economist Muhammad Yunus leading the new interim government as chief adviser.
“The United Nations is sending a UN fact-finding team next week to probe atrocities committed during the Student Revolution in July and early this month,” Yunus’s press wing said in a statement.
It is the first time since Bangladesh’s independence in 1971 that the UN is sending a fact-finding mission to investigate widespread human rights abuses in the country of 170 million people.
Yunus has said human rights will be “the cornerstone of his administration,” while the protection of every citizen is his government’s “top-most priority,” as he seeks UN cooperation to rebuild the country.
The government of Hasina, who has been in India since her ouster, has long been accused of human rights abuses during its 15 years in power, including mass detention and extrajudicial killing.
Hasina is facing a rising number of cases in Bangladesh, including charges of murder, genocide and crimes against humanity that took place during the student-led mass protests.
“An independent investigation is the demand of the time over the incidents of recent atrocities,” rights activist Mohammad Nur Khan told Arab News.
“Ensuring justice for these incidents is very important because there is a long history in Bangladesh that these sort of incidents go unpunished. If people get true justice today, it will convey a strong message that no one gets away by committing crimes against humanity.”
