Joint Letter: Requesting urgent action towards UN human rights monitoring and investigation in Bangladesh

Excellencies, 

Recent events have placed Bangladesh at a critical juncture. Given the current precarity of the situation, the UN Human Rights Council should urgently support the establishment of an independent international justice and accountability mechanism to investigate recent rights violations during protests, and additionally ensure ongoing independent UN monitoring of the situation and reporting to the Council.

Hundreds are presumed to have been killed, and thousands injured, during the unprecedented crackdown on the ‘Bangla-Blockade’ quota-reform protests, with excessive use of force, between July 15 and August 5, 2024. These protests ultimately led to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s resignation on August 5, 2024. The UN human rights chief, Volker Türk, has pledged a UN-led investigation into the killing of protesters.[1]

Soon after Sheikh Hasina resigned and left the country, tens of thousands of Bangladeshis celebrated the end of her rule.[2] In some places, however, celebrations turned violent, with hundreds killed or injured as demonstrators engaged in reprisals against those perceived to have supported Hasina’s government.[3] Thousands of Hindu minorities gathered at the border, seeking to enter India, fearing further attacks.[4]  

An interim government led by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus has been sworn in to office but with communities divided, there are severe risks of further grave human rights abuses. Police have been targeted as reprisals for past abuses, leading to the death of several policemen and vandalising of police stations. This has resulted in severe gaps in law enforcement and protection for minority groups and others facing violent attacks.[5] 

We therefore urge you to take immediate steps to ensure an independent investigation and accountability and to prevent further human rights violations by ensuring that the UN Human Rights Council:

• Establishes an independent mechanism with a comprehensive mandate to investigate, collect, store, and analyse evidence and cooperate with credible and independent national and international bodies towards accountability in relation to the violent incidents of July and August 2024 and its root causes. The material scope of an investigation should encompass acts by all relevant actors, including security force abuses and violence against peaceful protesters by ruling party supporters during protests between July 15 and August 5, 2024, as well as attacks on minorities and perceived Awami League supporters in the aftermath of Sheikh Hasina’s resignation on and after August 5.
• Mandates a comprehensive monitoring and reporting process on the situation in Bangladesh by the newly-established independent mechanism and/or the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, throughout the interim government’s transition period, with regular updates to the Council.
• Through these entities, monitors whether the Bangladeshi authorities comply with their obligation under international human rights law to impartially, independently, and effectively investigate any person reasonably suspected of criminal responsibility for crimes under international law and other serious human rights abuses, and to ensure that alleged perpetrators are brought to justice through fair trials without recourse to the death penalty.
• Supports the establishment of a national independent accountability mechanism, that operates in accordance with international standards, accounting for violations prior to July 2024, including but not limited to enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and torture with capacity for truth telling and reparations.
• Supports the interim government to urgently strengthen its legal and judicial capacity to undertake investigations into crimes under international law and gross human rights violations and ensure the full independence of legal and judicial bodies, including an effective national human rights commission in line with the Paris Principles.

The deadliest crackdown in Bangladesh’s history

At least 440 people were killed, and thousands were injured in three weeks in July and August, as Bangladeshi security forces and supporters of Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League party quashed student-led protests.[6]  The protests were sparked in early July 2024 when courts reinstated a quota reserving 30 percent of government jobs for the relatives of veterans of the country’s independence war, which protesters argued favoured supporters of the then-ruling party. These protests were peaceful until July 15, when members of the Bangladesh Chatra League (BCL) and Jubo League, youth groups of the Awami League party, backed by security forces, violently dispersed the protesters, killing six people.[7] 

Solidarity protests spread across the country, and in some places turned violent.[8] In addition to the police, the government deployed the Border Guards Bangladesh (BGB), the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), and the army to quell the protests. The government additionally ordered a curfew and shut down the internet. Following these measures, on August 4, over 114 people were killed as protesters clashed with security forces and ruling party activists. The next day, August 5, 2024, tens of thousands defied the curfew and started marching towards the capital, Dhaka. Sheikh Hasina fled the country on the same day.[9] 

A petition convened by Amnesty International, demanding a thorough, effective, independent, and impartial investigation into the deaths and other human rights violations, has been signed by over 15,000 people from 96 countries and territories.[10]

Human rights organizations monitored and documented the grave human rights violations committed by Bangladeshi security forces and authorities during the policing of the protests.[11] United Nations officials and experts repeatedly warned against the unnecessary and excessive use of force.[12] 

Evidence collected and verified by Amnesty International demonstrates that Bangladeshi security forces repeatedly used unlawful force against unarmed student protesters, including the use of tear gas in enclosed spaces and indiscriminately firing rubber bullets, shotguns loaded with pellets, and assault rifles loaded with lethal ammunition.[13] Members of the BCL and Jubo League reportedly attacked protesters, including as they were receiving medical treatment in hospitals.[14] 

Nearly 10,000 people were arrested and detained.[15] Over 200,000 faced criminal charges over alleged protest related violence.[16] The mass arrest and arbitrary detention of student protesters further perpetuated a climate of fear. 

Bangladesh’s repeated failure to comply with international law

Security forces used unlawful force, including lethal force, against protesters, disregarding the right to life and to freedom from torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and the United Nations Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials. Human rights organizations have also received reports of torture and other ill-treatment of protesters after they were detained.

On July 18, the government implemented a nationwide internet shutdown, making it almost impossible for activists, protesters, and journalists to communicate and report on abuses. On July 19, the authorities imposed a ban on all rallies and processions, with orders to shoot-on-site anyone out after curfew.[17]

The total shutdown of the internet was unnecessary and disproportionate, and harmed security, mobility, and livelihoods of Bangladeshi people. It also inhibited human rights monitors and journalists from documenting abuses at precisely the time when people were most at risk. Nationwide internet access was partially restored on July 23. Mobile internet was restored on July 28 after an 11-day blackout.[18]

The shoot-on-sight curfew across the country marked an unprecedented clampdown on the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly.[19] Such blanket restrictions and coercive interventions violate Bangladesh’s international obligations as a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. 

History of Abuses and Demands for an Independent International Investigation

According to Bangladeshi human rights monitors, security forces carried out over 600 enforced disappearances since 2009, when Sheikh Hasina first took office. While some people were later released, produced in court, or said to have died during an armed exchange with security forces, nearly 100 people remain missing.[20] The government refused to take up the offer from the United Nations to help establish a specialized mechanism to investigate allegations of enforced disappearances in line with international standards.[21] Instead, Bangladesh authorities continue to harass and intimidate victims’ families.[22]

The government ignored repeated requests from the UN Committee against Torture to follow up on its recommendations, as required.[23] The Committee’s recommendations included the independent monitoring of all detention sites and investigation of all allegations of torture and other ill-treatment by law enforcement officials. The United States government brought human rights sanctions against the Rapid Action Battalion in 2021, notorious for extrajudicial executions, disappearances and torture.[24]

After Sheikh Hasina resigned and fled the country, security forces have released some “disappeared” individuals who were held in unlawful detention for many years.[25] The military has pledged to investigate other sites in which detainees were held in secret.[26]

Families of the disappeared, and those killed in so-called “crossfire” under the Sheikh Hasina government,[27] are calling for an independent Commission of Inquiry to establish the facts, identify perpetrators, and ensure proper prosecutions. 

We emphasize the urgent need to secure and preserve evidence and to establish the responsibility of military commanders and civilian superiors for crimes committed by subordinate forces under their effective command, control, or authority. 

Thanking you for your attention,

Signed:

1. Amnesty International
2. Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network
3. Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances
4. Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA)
5. Capital Punishment Justice Project
6. CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation
7. Fortify Rights
8. Human Rights Watch
9. The International Truth and Justice Project
10. International Federation for Human Rights
11. International Organization for Transitional Justice and Peace
12. Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights
13. World Organisation against Torture