A US State Department annual report highlighted concerns about continuing human rights abuses in Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, Egypt and other authoritarian nations, as well as the impact the coronavirus pandemic has had on rights practices around the world. Unfortunately, in this report, the US State Department has made some wrong statements about Bangladesh, which in my opinion is continuous propaganda of vested interest groups such as Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI).
Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal has said the US State Department’s recent human report on the abuse of power by the country’s law enforcement agencies is contradictory.
He made the remarks in response to a question from reporters at his secretariat office.
“The number of disappearances and murders that were included in the report in 2021 was not correct as our record”, he added.
“If anyone is killed in a gunfight with our security forces, even if the security forces fire in self-defence, an executive magistrate investigates every case and if he/she proves the truth of the incident, we will close that matter”, he added.
“If the executive magistrate thinks that the incident or gunfights have taken place sans valid ground, we send it to the judiciary. None is above the law in our country”, said the minister.
He said those who did wrong here have to face the law. “So, I think they (the US State Department) misrepresented the facts in its report”, Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal Said.
Bangladesh’s Home Minister also said every incident of disappearance and murder was investigated properly. “But in many cases, it was found that they went into hiding due to personal reasons”.
But the US report said it was disappearance or murder, this is not true, Kamal also added.
“Security forces brought many people by sincere investigation. I can still firmly say that the published report is a fabricated one”, said the minister.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken unveiled the report with a grim outlook.
“Backsliding (of respect of human rights) has, unfortunately, continued,” Blinken said, citing Russia’s “brutal war” on Ukraine.
“We see what this receding tide is leaving in its wake – the bodies, hands bound, left on streets; the theaters, train stations, apartment buildings reduced to rubble with civilians inside,” said the top US diplomat as Russia continues to commit systematic and large-scale atrocities in Ukraine.
On Russia, the State Department’s 2021 human rights report underlined violence against and imprisonment of Kremlin critics. Just this week, one of the main opponents of Russian President Vladimir Putin and a critic of Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine, Vladimir Kara-Murza, was arrested and has been detained in Moscow.
Others, including Alexey Navalny who had been poisoned and jailed, are listed as examples of Russia’s arbitrary deprivation of life and politically motivated reprisals against individuals inside and outside the country.
“We urge Russia to cease the abuse of repressive laws” to target its own citizens, nonviolent and peaceful protesters, as well as individuals who are doing nothing more than advocating their universal rights, said State Department spokesperson Ned Price.
Even before Russia’s invasion, the State Department said Moscow’s 2014 occupation and purported annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula has had a significant negative effect on the human rights situation.
“The Russian government continued to arm, train, lead, and fight alongside Russia-led separatist forces in eastern Ukraine. Authorities also conducted politically motivated arrests, detentions, and trials of Ukrainian citizens in Russia, many of whom claimed to have been tortured,” according to the report.
For almost five decades, the State Department has issued its annual Country Report on Human Rights Practices. The 2021 report covers 198 countries and territories around the globe.
US State Department report far from reality
Dhaka called the United States (US) country report on human rights practices in Bangladesh “far from reality” with state minister for foreign affairs Md Shahriar Alam saying it appeared that the document was based on “anti-government propaganda machines”.
“We will thoroughly study the report and share our comments on Sunday”, he told reporters in an initial reaction regarding the report.
But, Alam said, he briefly glanced through the report and found it to have blamed Bangladesh government on many issues without justification and “it (report) is far from reality”.
The junior minister said he guessed that the primary data of the report was collected from the “anti-government propaganda machines”.
“We expect our friend (the US) to understand our ground reality”.
He said that Bangladesh would discuss the issues related to the report during its upcoming series of engagements with the US.
Alam added that Dhaka would do whatever was necessary to help the US government come out from the “wrong perception” and its human rights situation in Bangladesh.
The US report, however, acknowledged that Bangladesh took “few measures” to investigate and prosecute cases of corruption and abuse and killing by security forces.
Alam negated the words “few measures” saying Bangladesh government so far sacked 190 security personnel for violating human rights.
“You can’t call this number ‘few’”, he said.
The report claimed wide range of rights violation took place in Bangladesh in 2021 that included unlawful or arbitrary killings, extrajudicial killings, forced disappearance, torture or cases of inhuman and serious restrictions on free expression and media.
The report also said LGBTQs were also exposed to threats or intimidations while alleged that there were serious problems of independence of judiciary as well.
According to the report, the US state department prepared the “fact-based” document in consultations with experts on workers’ rights, police and security issues, women’s issues, and other topics.
US embassy officials in a media briefing in Dhaka, meanwhile, said their country report on HR practices not only found incidents of human right abuses but also saw positive trends which were going on in Bangladesh.
“The (Bangladesh) government took (measures) to either correct those (human rights) abuses or to roll out programs to human rights and other areas”, an embassy official told the briefing at the American Centre.
United States needs to lift sanctions on Rapid Action Battalion
On December 10, 2021, the US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Bangladesh’s elite paramilitary force, the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), as well as seven of its current and former officers due to serious human rights violations. This has created a stir in Bangladesh. The list of individuals includes current and former RAB chiefs. The sanctions were imposed on Rapid Action Battalion despite the fact that this elite force of Bangladesh Police has been continuing praiseworthy efforts in combating militancy and terrorism in Bangladesh, while it also effectively combats drugs, extortion and other forms of crimes.
Considering the existing friendly relations between Dhaka and Washington, the US authorities need to immediately lift these unfortunate sanctions and encourage Rapid Action Battalion in continuing its praiseworthy efforts.
