NN Online:
The Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearance has revealed that deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina, along with several high-ranking officials, is involved in cases of enforced disappearances in Bangladesh.
Justice Mainul Islam Chowdhury – the chairman of the commission – said this while handing over the commission’s report to Chief Adviser Professor Muhammad Yunus on Saturday.
The commission also identified involvement of some high-ranking officials of security forces and her government including her defence adviser Major General (retd) Tarique Ahmed Siddique in this regard, he added.
The probe team dug out connection of former director general of the National Telecommunication Monitoring Centre, and sacked Major General Ziaul Ahsan, senior police officers Monirul Islam and Md Harun-Or-Rashid, with several incidents of enforced disappearance. The five-member commission led by retired justice Mainul Islam Chowdhury handed over the report titled “Unfolding The Truth” to the chief adviser at the state guest house Jamuna.
The commission in its report said it has identified over eight secret detention centres of the fallen Awami League era operated by different security agencies in Dhaka and Chattogram.
“To date, we [commission] have identified more than eight secret detention facilities operated by agencies such as Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), and Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC), where victims were held across the country,” the commission report said.
Of them, several secret detention centres were found still intact, while others had been destroyed, it added.
The commission said it conducted visits to twelve offices of various security forces in Dhaka and Chattogram as the purpose of these visits was to inspect interrogation rooms, detention facilities, and equipment, gather information and testimony, and meet with senior officials from law enforcement and security forces.
To safeguard the integrity of the inquiry, the details of these facilities will be disclosed in a future report, it said.
The commission said they already recorded a total of 1,676 complaints of enforced disappearances, while 758 complaints have already been scrutinised. It estimates the number of enforced disappearances in the country would cross 3,500.
While submitting the report, the commission chairman said they had found a “systematic design” so that the incidence of enforced disappearances remains undetected.
The chairman of the commission also said they would deliver another interim report in March and would require at least another year to complete the scrutiny of all allegations they had received.
