Former Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina said she plans to return to the country by December despite the possibility that she could be killed, arrested or imprisoned.
Bangladesh’s army has taken brigadier general Miftah Uddin Ahmed into custody after an International Crimes Tribunal complaint accused him and 10 others in the 2018 killing of Teknaf municipal councilor Ekramul Haque.
Bangladesh’s government has released a draft law proposing the death penalty or life imprisonment for the gravest cases of enforced disappearance, including cases in which a victim dies.
International Crimes Tribunal Number 2 has accepted formal charges against former prime minister Sheikh Hasina and 40 others over their alleged involvement in the attack on Hefazat-e-Islam supporters at Shapla Chattar.
Accusing the elected Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) government of betraying the youth and ignoring the public’s mandate for structural change, National Citizen Party (NCP) head Nahid Islam delivered a blistering critique of the ruling party at an 11-party alliance divisional rally in Sylhet.
President Mohammed Shahabuddin may resign soon as discussions surrounding his departure intensify, according to media reports citing government and political sources.
More than three months have passed since 30-year-old fisherman Miraj Sheikh was reportedly taken away by Bangladesh Coast Guard officers. His family still does not know whether he is alive, where he is being held or what, if anything, he is accused of doing.
A former student protest leader and member of parliament Nahid Islam warned that former prime minister Sheikh Hasina would face execution if she returned to Bangladesh, delivering a fiery speech tied to the student-led uprising that forced her from office.
The Shapla Chattar killings refer to a deadly security operation carried out in Dhaka on the night of May 5 and the early hours of May 6, 2013, when police and other security forces dispersed thousands of supporters of Hefazat-e-Islam from the capital’s commercial district.
The International Crimes Tribunal’s investigation agency has submitted a draft report alleging that former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was the principal accused in the May 5, 2013, Shapla Chattar killings, with prosecutors saying they plan to file formal charges Tuesday to begin trial proceedings.
