'Disappeared' victims emerge in Bangladesh, seek justice despite hurdles
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[August 30, 2024]
By Krishn Kaushik, Maksud Un Nabi and Ruma Paul
DHAKA (Reuters) - Bangladesh indigenous people's rights activist Michael
Chakma says he was woken up by his captors earlier this month in the
dark, tiny cell where he was being held and thrown into a car,
handcuffed and blindfolded.
"I thought they will kill me," he said. Instead, he was freed.
It was five years, Chakma told Reuters, since he was abducted by armed
men outside a bank near the capital Dhaka. Since then, he said, the
world outside did not know where he was or if he was even alive.
He was questioned about his opposition to then-Prime Minister Sheikh
Hasina and beaten for weeks, he said, but then left alone in one of what
he said were "hundreds" of cells with no sunlight at an unknown
detention facility.
Hasina had ruled the South Asian nation of 200 million people for the
past 15 years, marked by arrests of opposition leaders, crackdowns on
free speech and suppression of dissent, and she resigned this month in
the face of deadly student-led protests that killed hundreds.
Investigations into how hundreds of people were "disappeared", and some
executed, during her tenure are a priority for the interim government
led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus.

Human Rights Watch said in a report in 2021 that according to
Bangladeshi human rights groups, nearly 600 people have been forcibly
"disappeared" by security forces since 2009.
It verified 86 enforced disappearances cases in which the fate of the
victims remains unknown. Others were freed, shown as arrested or found
dead, it said.
The rights group and activists say the victims were held in different
detention centres across the country and any involvement of the army,
paramilitary or police could pose a challenge to the interim
government's investigations.
Spokespersons for Bangladesh's military and police did not respond to
requests seeking comment.
Hasina, who is living at an undisclosed location near the Indian capital
New Delhi, could not be reached. Her son Sajeeb Wazed, who lives in the
U.S. and has been speaking on her behalf, did not respond to questions
about these allegations.
The government has formed a five-member commission, headed by a former
high court judge, to probe the disappearances.
"There are concerns that perpetrators might try and cover up their
crimes," said Asia Deputy Director for Human Rights Watch Meenakshi
Ganguly. "As a first step, the security forces should release all those
that are disappeared, or if they were killed in custody, provide answers
to the families."
'DIFFICULT TO BREATHE'
Chakma was freed on Aug. 7 in teak gardens near Chittagong district in
southeastern Bangladesh, around 250 km (150 miles) from Dhaka. He said
he did not know then that Hasina had been ousted from office and fled to
neighboring India less than two days earlier.
Sitting in a small room with a table and a few plastic chairs in an
apartment in Dhaka, Chakma, a short, stocky man, controlled his tears as
he shared his ordeal.

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Indigenous people's rights activist Michael Chakma, who was released
after being held in a clandestine prison for more than five years,
poses for a photograph at a park in Dhaka, Bangladesh, August 23,
2024. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain

"It was difficult to breathe. Initially, they told me that they
would release me soon, but as months and years passed, I gave up
hope of getting out. Each day felt like 100 days there."
At least two other people were freed after what they said were years
of secret detention on the same day as Chakma, but few details have
emerged on who held them and where.
The interim government said this week the commission will
"investigate enforced disappearances that occurred" since Jan. 1,
2010 "allegedly involving members of the police" and arms of the
paramilitary, intelligence and military.
Nur Khan, a member of the commission and a prominent human rights
activist in Bangladesh, told Reuters that the members are yet to
meet so it was "very difficult to talk about how optimistic we are
about the success of the commission."
But, he added: "With the forming of this commission the victims and
their families at least have a platform from where they can seek
fair trial and punishment for the perpetrators."
Reuters spoke to 15 people, including victims of such detentions,
families of some who are still missing, human rights advocates,
government officials and observers, about the challenge to seek
justice.
One was Shafiqul Islam Kajol, a photojournalist in Dhaka who says he
was kidnapped by a group of eight or nine people at gunpoint near
Dhaka University in March 2020.
Talking to Reuters from London, he said: "They beat me a lot there."

Between threats of killing him, he said his captors asked him about
what he knew about Hasina.
"They tortured me... I used to bleed from my nose and mouth," Kajol
said.
After 53 days in captivity, he says he was left near a border town
and promptly arrested by Bangladesh's border police. He was released
in December, 2020, after the courts acquitted him of trespassing
charges.
Kajol went to London on a visit last year and applied for asylum,
which is still under review.
"I want to return to my country if I get security. I want to file a
case against all those who disappeared me, including Sheikh Hasina,"
Kajol said.
Chakma also said he was willing to depose before the commission but
worried about his safety.
"There were many people involved in these crimes, and they remain
strong."
These people have "created a system that is beyond all
accountability, so I am not sure how much this government can change
them", he said.
(Reporting by Krishn Kaushik, Maksud Un Nabi and Ruma Paul in Dhaka,
Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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