As a signatory to the UN Convention against Torture, Bangladesh government's stance against torture remains only in paper as police torture and extrajudicial killings go unabated.
It was stated in a news item run by the United Nations humanitarian information service IRIN on Thursday, referring to the reports of human rights organisation Odhikar and New York-based Human Rights Watch. Citing the recent examples of torture on Dhaka University student Abdul Kader and college student Limon Hossain, the report said rights activists, officials and citizens called for an end to the continuing police torture and extrajudicial killings in Bangladesh.
In March 2011, RAB was publicly criticised for shooting college student Limon Hossain in the leg in Jhalakathi, southern district of Bangladesh, said the report.
The report headlined 'BANGLADESH: Calls for end to torture, extrajudicial killings' said prime minister's defence adviser Tarique Ahmed Siddique and home minister Sahara Khatun defended RAB, which accused Limon and his family of having criminal connections.
Limon was eventually freed after the media and rights activists drew public attention to the case and his innocence, said the report.
Abdul Kadar, a Dhaka University student, told IRIN he was recently tortured and arrested on trumped-up charges on his way home from his sister's house, said the report.
'He said police beat him and used sticks and sharp objects to make him confess to crimes he did not commit. He was charged with possessing lethal weapons, robbery and carjacking, then put in jail. Following campaigns by the media and rights activists, the High Court ordered him to be released on August 3 after 18 days in detention. One of the officers involved has been suspended,' said the report.
'I was not served water while I was crying out in pain and I was not taken to hospital even 18 hours after my arrest,' Kadar quoted to have said in the report.
It quoted Odhikar report to have said at least 10 people had been tortured to death by law enforcement agencies in the first six months of 2011.
It said Odhikar documented 67 torture cases in 2010, of which 22 people reportedly died while there were 68 cases of reported torture in custody in 2009.
The report also quoted New York-based Human Rights Watch to have said nearly 200 people had allegedly been killed by the Rapid Action Battalion, an elite law-enforcement agency, since 2009.
No RAB officer has ever been prosecuted for any of the killings carried out by the force, said the report quoting the Human Rights Watch report.
The report quoted chairman of the National Human Rights Commission of Bangladesh Mizanur Rahman to have said a lack of accountability within the law enforcement system is to blame for the persistent evidence of torture seen by the commission.
'Torture in police custody and extrajudicial killings by law enforcers in Bangladesh is one of our top priority concerns and areas of intervention,' Mizanur Rahman was quoted to have said in the report. 'This must be stopped,' he added.
There is a growing sense of impunity felt by law enforcement officials with regard to torture, and this must stop now or it is going to get worse here, said secretary of Odhikar Adilur Rahman Khan in the report.
'Most of the victims of torture do not report it out of fear; therefore, whatever data we have is just the tip of the iceberg,' he said in the report.
Our law enforcers need to be trained up on human rights to stop torture and extrajudicial killings, Sultana Kamal, a former adviser to the caretaker government and head of Ain O Shalish Kendra, a legal aid and human rights organisation, and also chairman of Transparency International Bangladesh, said in the report. 'To achieve this goal, "the government's political will is critical," she was quoted to have said in the report.
Asked to comment on the rights groups' concern about the torture, secretary of the ministry of home affairs Abdus Sobhan Sidker told IRIN: 'The government of Bangladesh does not accept the usage of torture or extrajudicial killing and will do everything in its power to stop it.'
Source : New Age
