Shawdesh Deks:

Terming Bangladesh’s report to the United Nations on convention against torture as ‘unrealistic’, rights activists on Saturday said that the country was on the verge of becoming a failed state due to the prevalence of torture, secret detention and extrajudicial killing.

They also termed the country’s situation as ‘terrible’, a fact that was missing in the country’s report placed at the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights last month in Geneva.

The activists and eminent citizen of the country were speaking at a discussion in the city.

They urged the United Nations to resort to its mechanism under the UN rights programme to improve the rights situation and hold a dialogue in Bangladesh.

A civil rights platform, Moulik Adhikar Surakkha Committee (Committee for the Protection of Fundamental Rights), organised the discussion under the title ‘Our Observation: Analysis of the implementation of the United Nations Convention against Torture,’ at the National Press Club to present their views on the recent meeting held in Geneva on July 30-31.

The Bangladesh government has submitted its initial state report to the Committee against Torture more than 20 years after it acceded to the UN Convention  against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment in 1984, in its 67th Session in Geneva.

Under Article 19 of the UNCAT, each state party is under obligation to submit its initial report to the Committee Against Torture (‘the Committee’) within one year from the date of ratification or accession.

‘We appreciate the government as its finally responded as none of the previous governments responded or reported to them [the UN rights agency],’ Supreme court lawyer Sara Hossain said.

‘But, I must say that answers were not given to the questions raised so far…. Many issues were avoided including that of the implementation of the laws,’ she observed.

Rights activist Sara said since the matter related to the United Nations and its agencies, it [the UN] has obligation to see whether the legal instruments were being implemented in Bangladesh.

‘They [the UN and its agencies] can hold a dialogue here in Bangladesh]…. We also appeal to the UN and the international community to hold a dialogue to listen to what were being discussed in the international forum,’ she said, speaking at the discussion.

‘Since we are not getting any remedy in the country, we are looking forwards to an international process,’ said jurist Shahdeen Malik in his concluding remark.

He termed the belated Bangladesh report to the UN as an ‘unrealistic report’, especially in the context of the rights situation in the country.

‘With everything, the situation is terrible,’ he said, adding, ‘a country does not turn a failed state overnight. It progresses towards it gradually.’

We are not talking about basic rights such as jobs and freedom of expression. Minimum protection is needed against the scourges, including extrajudicial killing, cruel torture in detention, enforced disappearance and torture as well as secret detention for months on end, Shahdeen pointed out.

He said countries where bombs are exploded on daily basis, if one looks closely into their state of affairs, one will find that those countries started with torture and extrajudicial killing.

Shahdeen also argued that with this existing judicial system, torture could not be prevented.

‘I fear that we are heading towards a failed state,’ the jurist concluded.

He further said that those who committed crimes they possessed a faulty idea of they were engaging in them for the nation, as was the case in Hitler’s Germany where killing 6 million Jews were seen as their duty.

Shahdeen dubbed the country’s on-going development as ‘foul talk’ and referred to Libya and Syria where the per capita income was much higher than that of Bangladesh, but they became failed states as their security apparatuses went beyond accountability.

Health activist Zafrullah Chowdhury, former diplomat Mohiduddin Ahmed, photographer Shahidul Alam, writer Rehnuma Ahmed, Supreme Court lawyer and rights activists Jyotirmoy Barua and Farida Akhter, among others, attended the programme, which was moderated by Shireen Huq of Naripokkho.

Bangladesh, however, is not a party to the Optional Protocol to the UNCAT and in its state report stated that the National Human Rights Commission received 77 complaints about allegation of torture during 2012-2019.

Twenty eight members led by the law minister Anisul Huq attended the review by the United Nations committee against torture on the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (the “Torture Convention”) held in Geneva on July 30 and 31.

Retried diplomat Mohiuddin Ahmed said they have not seen such large delegation except during the prime minister’s visit to the UN office.