UN rights chief, Amnesty Int’l issue statements
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay yesterday expressed deep concern over sentencing of 152 people to death over the 2009 BDR mutiny and said it fell far short of international human rights standards. “The crimes committed during the mutiny were utterly reprehensible and heinous, and my sympathies are with the grieving families, but justice will not be achieved by conducting mass trials of hundreds of individuals, torturing suspects in custody and sentencing them to death after trials that failed to meet the most fundamental standards of due process,” she said in a statement.
“The perpetrators of the crimes must be held accountable in compliance with the laws of Bangladesh and the country’s international obligations, including those pertaining to fair trial standards, as laid down in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Bangladesh ratified in 2000. The trial of these 847 suspects has been rife with procedural irregularities, including the lack of adequate and timely access to lawyers,” read the statement.
The UN rights chief called for an independent and thorough investigation into the allegations of human rights abuses, particularly custodial torture and deaths that took place after the mutiny.
On Tuesday, a special court in Dhaka sentenced 152 people to death and 161 others to life imprisonment for their involvement in murder and carnage during the 2009 mutiny in the paramilitary force.
The mutiny broke out at the BDR (now BGB) headquarters at Pilkhana in the capital on February 25, 2009, just two months after a newly elected government took office, resulting in the deaths of 74 people, including 57 army officers.
Pillay also expressed concern about the conduct of the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) saying, “The ICT should be a very important means to tackle impunity for the mass atrocities committed in 1971, and to provide redress to the victims who have had a long and difficult road to justice.”
But it is important that the proceedings meet the highest standards if they are to reinforce the rule of law in Bangladesh and the fight against impunity in the broader region, she mentioned.
AMNESTY SLAMS BDR VERDICT
Amnesty International has termed “a perversion of justice” Tuesday’s death penalty handed down to 152 people for the carnage at BDR headquarters in 2009.
Justice has not been served with the ruling, “which, if carried out, will only result in 152 more human rights violations,” said Polly Truscott, Amnesty’s deputy Asia-Pacific director, in a statement yesterday.
Those sentenced were among hundreds of troops from the erstwhile Bangladesh Rifles (BDR), convicted of engaging in unlawful killings, hostage taking and other human rights violations committed during the February 2009 mutiny.
The rights body has previously condemned the violence and called for those responsible to be brought to justice in fair trials.
“There is no question that the 2009 mutiny was a brutal series of events that left in its wake scores of people dead and a traumatised population. It is understandable that the Bangladeshi authorities want to draw a line under this episode, but to resort to the use of the death penalty can only compound the suffering,” read the statement.
“With these sentences, Bangladesh has squandered an opportunity to reinforce trust in the rule of law by ensuring the civilian courts deliver justice. Instead, the sentences seem designed to satisfy a desire for cruel revenge,” it added.
The death penalty, said Amnesty, is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment and has not been proven to be a deterrent to crime.
-With The Daily Star input
