Bangladesh’s security forces have killed more than 1,000 people in extrajudicial slayings during the past five years, an international human rights group said in a report released yesterday.
Human Rights Watch called for the government to investigate the deaths and bring those responsible to justice.
“If you are a soldier, a member of the Rapid Action Battalion or the intelligence services, or a police officer, you can get away with murder in Bangladesh,” said Brad Adams, Asia director of Human Rights Watch.
The security forces break the law “in the gravest manner without ever facing any consequences,” Adams said.
New York-based Human Rights Watch released a report yesterday titled Ignoring Executions and Torture: Impunity for Bangladesh’s Security Forces.
Faruk Khan, a senior member of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Cabinet, said the government did not support extrajudicial killings and would investigate the allegations.
“The government is determined to prevent such incidents,” said Khan, a former army officer. “If anyone is found guilty of such killing, proper action will be taken.”
Crime suspects in Bangladesh are often killed while in custody in incidents authorities usually describe as “crossfire.” Local watchdogs say the shootouts are staged and amount to little more than executions.
Odhikar, a Bangladeshi rights group, says 14 people have been killed while in custody so far this year, according to a tally gleaned from media reports.
When Shanghai-based designer Guo Qingshan posted a vacation photo on Valentine’s Day and captioned it “Puppy Mountain,” it became a sensation in China and even created a tourist destination. Guo had gone on a hike while visiting his hometown of Yichang in central China’s Hubei Province late last month. When reviewing the photographs, he saw something he had not noticed before: A mountain shaped like a dog’s head rested on the ground next to the Yangtze River, its snout perched at the water’s edge. “It was so magical and cute. I was so excited and happy when I discovered it,” Guo said.
Chinese authorities said they began live-fire exercises in the Gulf of Tonkin on Monday, only days after Vietnam announced a new line marking what it considers its territory in the body of water between the nations. The Chinese Maritime Safety Administration said the exercises would be focused on the Beibu Gulf area, closer to the Chinese side of the Gulf of Tonkin, and would run until tomorrow evening. It gave no further details, but the drills follow an announcement last week by Vietnam establishing a baseline used to calculate the width of its territorial waters in the Gulf of Tonkin. State-run Vietnam News
TURNAROUND: The Liberal Party had trailed the Conservatives by a wide margin, but that was before Trump threatened to make Canada the US’ 51st state Canada’s ruling Liberals, who a few weeks ago looked certain to lose an election this year, are mounting a major comeback amid the threat of US tariffs and are tied with their rival Conservatives, according to three new polls. An Ipsos survey released late on Tuesday showed that the left-leaning Liberals have 38 percent public support and the official opposition center-right Conservatives have 36 percent. The Liberals have overturned a 26-point deficit in six weeks, and run advertisements comparing the Conservative leader to Trump. The Conservative strategy had long been to attack unpopular Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, but last month he
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
RSS