Rights activists and academics have voiced fear at a webinar that the human rights situation may worsen again during the next national polls as the incidents of rights violation, including enforced disappearance, increase before and during the elections.
A decline in the incidents of rights violation after the United States’ recent sanctions on the Rapid Action Battalion cannot be a matter of complacency, they said at the webinar, held on Monday.
The Centre for Governance Studies organised the webinar on enforced disappearance on the occasion of unveiling its study titled Where are They? Enforced Disappearances in Bangladesh.
Sharing the findings of the study, Professor Ali Riaz, distinguished professor of political science at Illinois State University, USA, said that at least 71 people became victims of enforced disappearance between 2019 and 2021.
Of them, 16 victims are still missing, five others were found dead and 22 others have been either arrested, detained, or jailed.
At least, 522 people have become victims of enforced disappearance between 2009 and 2018, according to various human rights organisations.
The government’s policy of denial and inaction have served as acquiescence and provided a sense of impunity to the perpetrators and it has also declined to cooperate with the UN body which has been seeking information about the victims since 2011, the study said.
Professor Riaz said that enforced disappearance did not become systematic, regular, and widespread until 2010.
Dhaka University professor Asif Nazrul said that the incidents of enforced disappearance generally escalated before, after and during the election.
He said that despite internal and international pressure, the number of disappearances had not declined in recent years. On the contrary, after the US sanctions, the number of disappearances has decreased dramatically.
As a result of the US sanctions, the government has decreased the number of disappearances to the danger of personal damage, said Professor Nazrul.
Rights watchdog Ain o Salish Kendra secretary-general Nur Khan said that the decrease in disappearances, crossfire, and rights violation by law enforcement agencies did not indicate the end of the problem.
The pattern of disappearances, he claims, is pretty evident. During the elections, there was an area-based disappearance competition even before 2019. Out of terror, the majority of individuals who have returned following their abduction refuse to open their mouths, he said.
He claimed that just a few people had spoken since their return and that their descriptions suggested that the nation had hidden prisons, where people were held in secret. He went on to say that the kidnappings were not only carried out by people dressed in white, but also by police personnel.
Nur Khan said that there were precedents before when there were public outcries over some issues, the incidents crossfire and disappearance decreased for a short period, but only to return again as the outcries faded away.
Shushashoner Jonno Nagorik secretary Badiul Alam Majumdar expressed his fear that the incidents of enforced disappearance might return to haunt again before the upcoming national polls.
He said that the incidents of enforced disappearance in Bangladesh were being carried out on purpose for political reasons and the government would be able to maintain unilateral power by instilling terror in its citizens.
Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Association chief executive Syeda Rizwana Hasan said that enforced disappearance was a strategy for maintaining power by instilling fear in the public.
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