Several newspapers on Monday reported Home Minister Sahara Khatun\u2019s comments regarding extrajudicial killings. The Home Minister said, \u201cThe law enforcement agencies are not carrying out any extrajudicial killings. Those who died were engaged in gunfight with the Police and RAB forces\u201d.\u00a0 Sahara Khatun also asked the reporters, \u201cWill the law enforcement officers just stand there and do nothing while they are getting shot at by extremists?\u201d<\/p>\n
In recent times, the law and order situation in the southwest region of the country has seen significant deterioration. Due to the increased activities of the extremist and terrorist groups, resulting in a number of murders, Police and RAB forces have been carrying out special operations in the region. The Home Minister said, \u201cThe clampdown being carried out in the southwest region is based on a list prepared by the law enforcement agencies and they will take any measure to apprehend extremists and terrorists\u201d<\/p>\n
Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK) strongly condemns these comments of Home Minister Sahara Khatun.<\/p>\n
From our own research and analysis of records and explanation of every incident provided by RAB, we have enough evidence to believe that \u201cCrossfire\u201d or \u201cEncounter\u201d, or whatever you may call it, is planned extrajudicial killing. According to Article 31 of our Constitution, it is the inalienable right of every citizen to enjoy the protection of the law, and receive treatment in accordance with law, and only in accordance with law. Article 32 states that a person shall not be deprived of life or personal liberty, save in accordance with law and article 33 establishes that every person who is arrested and detained shall be produced in a court of law as soon as possible. All these laws in our Constitution are hailed as fundamental rights and it is the Constitutional duty of a responsible minister of a democratically elected government to respect, protect and ensure that the rule of law in its rightful place.<\/p>\n
Since its inception on March 26 of 2004, to August 31 of 2009, 577 people have died in “Crossfire” in 472 incidents. This is the statistics provided by RAB and published in various newspapers. However, the data collected by ASK shows a much larger figure. Only in 2009, from January 9 until now, 49 people have died in crossfire. All these deaths, aimed at improving the law and order situation, did they achieve any significant improvement?<\/p>\n
ASK would like to remind the government of the high court ruling on June 29 of 2009, which asks them to explain why extrajudicial killings should not be declared illegal, and why departmental and criminal actions should not be taken against those who carry out such acts. During the hearing, the government side proclaimed there will be no more “Crossfire” and the Court said, “We believe you”. Along with the promise made in their electoral manifesto, the government also assured the United Nations Human Rights Council of their “Zero Tolerance” policy towards “Crossfire”. So when the Home Minister makes such comments, do they not stand in contradiction to the promise her own government made?<\/p>\n
It is true that, due to the lack of confidence on the current judicial system, a portion of the population end up supporting extrajudicial killings in many cases. \u00a0However, an elected government having trust in the rule of law, should make it their goal to strengthen such weaknesses and bring back the trust of the people in justice and should not use popular support as an excuse for extrajudicial killings. We have seen how politicians were against \u201cCrossfire\u201d when they were in opposition but changed their stand the moment they came to power, and were not shy to reap the benefit of this \u201cShort but effective\u201d technique. We want an end to this dichotomy, and hope the current government will not follow the footsteps of its predecessor but usher in a new era by realizing their promise of change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Several newspapers on Monday reported Home Minister Sahara Khatun\u2019s comments regarding extrajudicial killings. The Home Minister said, \u201cThe law enforcement agencies are not carrying out any extrajudicial killings. Those who…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-press-statement"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4777"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4777\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4778,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4777\/revisions\/4778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}