Human Rights Watch (HRW), the US-based international human rights organization, yesterday criticised the Bangladesh government for its prolonged nonchalance towards the enforced disappearances which allegedly have been conducted by its own law-enforcement agencies.

In a long 82-page report produced based on thorough research, the HRW said that since 2013, law enforcement authorities in Bangladesh have illegally detained scores of opposition activists and held them in secret without producing them before courts, as the law dictates.

In most cases, those arrested remain in custody for weeks or months before being formally arrested or released. Others, however, are killed in so-called armed exchanges, and many remain ‘disappeared’.

The HRW report gave special attentions to ‘disappearance’ cases of the ruling Awami League’s political opponents – BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami.

It said, law enforcement authorities repeatedly deny the arrests, with government officials backing these claims, often by suggesting that the men are voluntarily in hiding.

The report said that in almost all cases of enforced disappearances that Human Rights Watch documented, police did not allow the families to file a general diary (GD)—the simplest way to report a crime or incident to the police—if the

complaint contained an allegation that law enforcement authorities were involved.

Police either allowed the families onlyto file a GD stating that the person was ‘kidnapped’ by unidentified men, or more commonly to file a complaint saying that their family member was ‘missing’, the report claimed.

Apart from a few cases, the allegations of the families and witnesses have been totally ignored, and there have been no police inquiry.

In some cases where investigations have occurred, the inquiries have been cursory, without any attempt to interview eyewitnesses, it said.

The report said that the families of the disappeared have made repeated appeals to the government, visited DB (Detective Branch of Police) and RAB (Rapid Action Battalion) offices, and sought police investigations.

Some have filed cases before the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, while others have sought assistance from the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), or filed habeas corpus petitions before the High Court, said the report.

The HRW report recommended that the government should promptly investigate existing allegations of enforced disappearances, locate and release those held secretly by security forces, and prosecute the perpetrators.

These should include politically motivated cases involving the disappearances of members or supporters of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and the Jamaat-e-Islami, said the Human Rights Watch report.

It also said that Bangladesh government should invite the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to investigate these allegations and make appropriate recommendations to ensure justice, accountability, and security force reform.

The Bangladesh government should also invite UN experts, including the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances and the special rapporteur on torture,

for an official country visit, allowing them full, unimpeded access to the places and people they seek to visit, it said.

Meanwhile, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal has rejected a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report that blames the Sheikh Hasina government for enforced disappearances carried out allegedly by law enforcement agencies.

In its report, the international rights group recommended prompt investigation into allegations of such disappearances to “locate and release those held secretly”.

The HRW highlighted the “disappearance” cases of the Awami League’s political opponents, the Jamaat-e-Islami and the BNP.

Talking to the media in his Secretariat office yesterday (Thursday) the home minister said the organisation (HRW) has always been vocal against the Sheikh Hasina government.

“It carried out a negative propaganda against the government during the trials of war criminals. Whatever the rights organisation has said in its report on disappearances is not true,” he said.  

“Our law enforcers are always alert. Whenever someone was abducted or went missing, members of law enforcement agencies rescued and produced them before the court within 24 hours,” he added.

The road transport and bridges minister, Obaidul Quader, too spoke on the HRW report yesterday.

Rejecting the report. Quader, who is also the general secertary of the Awami League, said it is a conspiracy against the Sheikh Hasina government to tarnish its image.

He was talking to reporters at the Bangladesh Bridge Authority’s Setu Bhaban in the capital yesterday.

“Only one and a half years are left for the next general election. So, there will be conspiracies against the government before the polls. The HRW report is one such conspiracy,” he said.

He also called upon the HRW authorities to help the government rescue people by providing a list of persons they claim to be missing.