Shawdesh Desk:

A total of 241 global leading people in different fields including over 125 Nobel laureates have sent an open letter to Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina for the third time expressing their concern about judicial process against professor Muhammad Yunus.

The global leaders came up with the fresh call regarding the verdict of the labour law violation case against Professor Yunus and the case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission.

One of the signatories Sam Daley-Harris, founder of RESULTS and Civic Courage, confirmed New Age on Monday night that they had sent the open letter to PM Sheikh Hasina.

It has been proposed in the letter to send an international expert team to Bangladesh to review the two cases against professor Yunus.

The signatories of the letter include former US president Barack Obama and former US vice president Al Gore, who won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Former United Nations secretary general Ban Ki-moon, former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, British billionaire Sir Richard Branson, and more than a hundred prominent people are among the signatories of the letter.

Earlier, global leaders first sent open letter to Bangladesh prime minister in March 2023 and second time in August 2023 over the judicial process against Yunus.

In the latest letter, the global leaders said ‘We write to express profound concern over the continued harassment and potential jailing of Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus.’

‘We agree with Irene Khan, the United Nations special rapporteur for the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, who left the courtroom on January 1, 2024, and called the verdict “a travesty of justice”,’ the letter said.

‘We note with concern the rushed legal process and lack of consistency with regard to how Bangladesh’s laws are applied. The criminal case verdict included time in prison for four board members of Grameen Telecom, a nonprofit organization, including Professor Yunus, who is 83 and who serves the organization in an uncompensated non-executive chairman role.’

It is evident that, at most, only a small civil or administrative fine against Grameen Telecom was warranted under the relevant laws, it said.

‘We further note that the recent election in Bangladesh held on January 7, 2024, witnessed the suppression and imprisonment of opposition leaders, and crackdowns on the media and independent voices, which have been extensively documented by many human rights and other pro-democracy groups in Bangladesh and abroad.’

The letter also reads that ‘Responding to a previous letter on the ongoing harassment and intimidation of Professor Yunus, which was signed by more than 190 world leaders including 108 Nobel Prize winners (many of whom are also signatories to this letter), you (Bangladesh prime minister) told a news conference at the end of August 2023 that the signatories should ‘send experts, and lawyers to see if there is any injustice or whether the lawsuit was wrongfully done.’ We accept your invitation. This examination should include not only the labor law case whose verdict was delivered on January 1, but also the current investigation being conducted by the Anti-Corruption Commission.’

‘We would like to propose a senior international lawyer to lead a small team of independent legal experts to conduct this review. We would like to begin immediately and request that any jail sentences for Professor Yunus and his colleagues be suspended pending the review,’ the letter said.

‘Professor Yunus and his fellow defendants should not be facing the prospect of imprisonment. We urge you to uphold Bangladesh’s international human rights obligations including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Bangladesh is a state party, by immediately putting an end to this travesty of justice.’

Yunus, who is facing more than 170 cases, was sentenced on January 1, 2024 to six months in jail by the Dhaka Labour Court 3 in a case filed by DIFE for violating labour law at Grameen Telecom.

Yunus filed an appeal on Sunday with the Labour Appellate Tribunal, challenging the verdict.

Apart from this, ACC on Monday approved the charges against 14 people, including Nobel laureate and Grameen Telecom chairman Professor Muhammad Yunus, in a case filed on charges of misappropriating over Tk 25 crore from the company’s Workers Welfare Fund and money laundering.