At least 1,926 killed extrajudicially in 15 years of AL govt

Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s (BNP) general secretary of Kasihmbari union unit in Shyamnagar upazila of Satkhira, Oliullah Molla, was killed in a “crossfire” by the police on 10 July 2016. His family said the police, accompanied by several local leaders and activists of the Awami League, picked Oliullah up from his house that afternoon.

Oliullah’s family received the news of his death the next morning.

The police claimed at that time that one of their patrolling teams asked Oliullah, who was riding a motorcycle, to stop around 3:30 am. But instead of stopping, he hurled crude bombs and opened firing at the police. Then the police shot back in retaliation leading to his death.

Later, police filed the incident as a “gunfight” calling Oliullah a “terrorist”.

In the 15 years of the Awami League government, led by Sheikh Hasina, at least 1926 people were killed extrajudicially in such “gunfights” or “crossfires”, said a calculation of Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK), a human rights organisation. ASK prepared the reports based on different media reports.

The story the government put forth after every such killing was nearly identical. The government of Sheikh Hasina and her administration declined dubbing the incidents as extrajudicial killings from the very beginning until the fall.

However, Prothom Alo recently received a report of the police Special Branch (SB) on the incidents of crossfires from 2015 to 2021.

An analysis of this report reveals a total of 1,293 people were killed in the seven years. There was no district in the country where no such incident of extrajudicial killing was reported. Many of the victims were political leaders and activists.

ASK reports, however, say the number of deaths in those seven years, from 2015 to 2021, was 120 more than the number mentioned by the SB.

After every such incident, the concerned law enforcement agencies would file cases citing the concocted description of the crossfire, where many others were accused as accomplices of the victim.

In most cases, the families of the victims did not have the courage to file a lawsuit. Some were harassed and faced threats while trying to file a case in court.

After the killing of the BNP leader Oliullah eight years ago, his wife Salima also faced such a situation.

She told Prothom Alo on 28 October, “My husband was picked up and tortured and shot to death. We were threatened not to talk to anyone about this, and file any case. My husband’s brothers were also arrested.”

Salima filed a case in connection with the incident in a Satkhira court on 28 August.

The country has a long history of extrajudicial killings in the name of crossfire, with many saying that Siraj Shikder was the first victim of crossfire in independent Bangladesh.

The law enforcement agencies in subsequent times reiterated the police’s description of the incident that took place on 1 January 1975.

The issue of crossfire in the country was widely discussed in 2004 during the coalition government of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Jamaat-e-Islami.

In March 2004, the government formed the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) as the activities of top terrorists in the capital and the rampant killings of extremist terrorists in the South-West region of the country escalated.

At that time RAB came into the discussion by killing a few top terrorists, including Picchi Hannan, in Dhaka and alleged extremist terrorists in the southwestern districts in the name of “crossfire”. At the same time, the police also killed many in the name of “crossfire”. The goals of the two agencies were almost the same.

The government did not take into account the concerns of the rights organisations regarding the extrajudicial killings. Rather, at that time the pro-government people promoted a narrative that the “terrorists” were being killed. Through this there was an attempt to highlight “crossfire” as a rational act among the common people.

Sources said in the case of crossfire, law enforcement agencies initially targeted notorious criminals or terrorists. But later, extrajudicial killings were used for political, economic and personal conflicts, and at the direction of the powerful and as a measure to repress the opponents.

The trend of punishing political opponents through “crossfire” started mainly after the Bangladesh Awami League (AL) came to power in 2009.

Some of the officials involved in these incidents committed extrajudicial killings in exchange of money or being influenced by others. A glaring example of this is the incident of seven murders in Narayanganj on 27 April 2014. As many as 11 RAB members, including the then commander of RAB-11, Lieutenant Colonel Tarek Sayeed, were involved in the murders. They took money from local ward councillor Nur Hossain.

Analysing the SB list of crossfire incidents during the AL government, it was seen that there is an identification box next to the names of the victims. As many as 23 types of identities of the deceased were found there, including the BNP and Jamaat leaders and activists.

However, most of the deceased have been dubbed as “terrorist”, “criminal”, “gunman” or “armed”, “drug dealer”, “sea robber”, “forest robber”, “dacoit”, “mugger”, “accused”, “extremist” and so on. Many political activists were also alleged to have been killed in crossfire under these identities.

As many as 477 people killed in the crossfire in the seven years, from 2015 to 2021, were identified as drug dealers. Following that, most people, 300, were identified as robbers, Rohingya robbers and muggers. The identity of 142 people killed in those incidents was written as “terrorist”.

Five of them were identified as BNP men and nine as activists of Jamaat-Shibir. However, the SB did not mention the political identities of the victims after 2017.

Besides, 83 victims were identified as sea robbers, forest robbers and robbers, 33 as miscreants, 17 as accused in murder cases, 16 as accused in other cases and 38 as armed cadres. Moreover, seven victims were identified as either rapists or accused for rape, nine as human traffickers and six as members of local criminal gangs.

The police document did not mention any identity of 52 victims. Six of the victims were identified as members of armed groups of Chattogram Hill Tracts, three as smugglers and two as kidnappers.

Sources said while many of these victims were involved with crimes or accused in cases, others who were not involved with any such crimes were also killed in the name of crossfire.

One such incident in 2018 created nationwide outcry. On 26 May that year, Teknaf pourashava councilor Ekramul Haque was killed on Cox’s Bazar-Teknaf marine drive road in name of drive against drug dealers. Ekramul was president of Teknaf upazila Jubo League. However, he was identified as ‘drug trader’ in the list of the SB.

Ekram called his daughter while he was being taken to kill. Ekram was shot before the phone call was hung up. The call record went viral on social media. Ekram’s conversation with his daughter moments before being killed, screaming of his daughter, the sound of getting out of the car, and then the sound of gunshots stirred people.

Ekram’s wife Ayesha Begum termed the incident as ‘cold-blooded murder’. She told Prothom Alo on 31 October that RAB maintained that Ekram died in a shootout after shooting him with his hands tied. She thinks Ekram might have been killed due to political rivalry despite being an activist of the ruling party.

Ayesha also said, “We were not allowed to file any case, even file any general diary after the crossfire incident. But we faced harassment. Two important ministers of the Awami League government forbade me to talk about this in the media.” 

The analysis of police data on crossfire shows that between 2015 and 2021, there were 459 extrajudicial killings in Chattogram division, the highest among the eight divisions. Dhaka division saw the second highest crossfire deaths with 291 people getting killed, followed by Khulna, where 260 people were killed and Rajshahi with 116 victims.

Of the other divisitions, 29 died in Barishal division, 33 in Sylhet, 58 in Mymensingh and 47 in Rangpur.

During this period, all 64 districts saw ‘crossfire’ at one point or another point. Cox’s Bazar had the highest number of crossfire incidents in the district. In seven years (2015-21), 226 people were killed in the crossfire of police, RAB and other forces in this district. Dhaka has the second highest crossfire incident as a district as 151 people were killed here. Chattogram saw the third highest deaths with 70 people killed in the district. Sherpur, Jhalakathi, Gopalganj, Manikganj, Kurigram, Lalmonirhat and Panchagarh districts saw the least number of crossfire incidents between 2015 and 2021.

The SB’s data recorded 1,293 deaths in 1,007 crossfire incidents between 2015 and 2021. Of these incidents, police was involved with 651 incidents and RAB in 293 incidents. Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) was involved in 46 incidents. 10 incidents were jointly participated by police, RAB and BGB. The remaining incidents involved the Coast Guard and other forces. Name of no force was mentioned in one incident. 

This correspondent spoke to Md Rezaul Karim, the Deputy Inspector General of Police Headquarters, over the incidents of crossfire.

He told Prothom Alo, “There is no scope for any extrajudicial killing. We have sent this message to all levels of police. If any crime is proved against anyone in past incidents, we will also take action against them.”

This correspondent also spoke to five midlevel officers of police and RAB who were in different charges during 2015-21. They said anyone is sent to crossfire at the approval of or at the behest of higher authorities. In case of RAB, battalion commanders, additional directors general (operations) and even director general level had cognizance of the incidents.

Approval would be taken from the top of the government before killing anyone politically important.

The incidents of extrajudicial killings shot up in 2018, the year of eleventh parliament election. The election was held on 320 December that year. Earlier on 4 May that year, a special drive against drug was initiated. However, subsequent reports found that the drive did not contribute to decrease drug business.

The SB report recorded 358 deaths in 300 crossfire incidents in 2018. Of those, police was involved with 202 incidents, RAB with 96 and one was a joint drive of police and other forces and another was joint drive of BGB and RAB. Of the victims, 227 were shown as drug dealers and the remaining 46 were identified as either robbers or snatchers.

2018 saw the highest number of extra-judicial killings throughout Sheikh Hasina’s rule, followed by 2019 which saw 307 people being killed in 241 incidents of crossfires by the law enforcement agencies.

An analysis of statistics of the extra-judicial killings, crossfires rose before and after the parliamentary election during the one-and-a-half decade of Awami League’s rule.

According to Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK), 128 people were killed in crossfires in the tenth national election year of 2014 and 125 people died in the ninth national election year of 2009 while 93 people were killed in 2010, 62 in 2011m 58 in 2012 and 42 people died in crossfires in 2013.

Political parties said crossfire was one of the major tools of the Awami League government to suppress the opponent and create a culture of fear. That is why more such killings took place ahead and after the general elections.

According to BNP and its associate bodies, 651 of their leaders and activists were killed in crossfires during the 15 years of the Awami League government while Jamaat-e-Islami and Chhatra Shibir said more than 50 of their leaders and activists were killed by law enforcement agencies in similar style.

Regarding this, BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir told Prothm Alo, “Awami League killed people extra-judicially in planned ways including crossfires over the last 15 years and their motive was to annihilate the political opponents, uphold power and control elections.”

According to the police’s special branch, 124 were killed in police crossfires or gun battles with police and other forces in 2015, 163 in 2016, 164 in 2017, 147 in 2021 and 30 police were killed in 2021.

Police headquarters spokespersons and additional inspector general of police (media and public relations) Enamul Haque Sagor told Prothom Alo, “Incumbent police administration does not support extrajudicial killings and we want actual criminals to face trial under existing laws.”

The Sheikh Hasina government did not stop enforced disappearance and extrajudicial killings despite various criticisms at home and abroad. Rather they tried to legitimise the incidents.

The US imposed sanctions on the RAB and its seven current and former officials including former RAB director general and later inspector general of police Benazir Ahmed on allegations of ‘severe human rights violations’ on 10 December 2021.

Since then extrajudicial killings in the name of crossfire or gun battle dropped significantly. According to ASK, 4 people were killed in the crossfire by law enforcement agencies in 2022 and one in 2023.

The police reform commission formed by the interim government currently works so that no such event repeats in future. Commission head Safar Raz Hossain told Prothom Alo, “We are working on the reform of police giving utmost importance to human rights. We want to give several proposals after discussing with various stakeholders so that such events do not repeat in future.”

A dangerous trend of enforcedly disappearing people started at one stage of the Sheikh Hasina government in addition to carrying out extrajudicial killings in the name of crossfires. Enforced disappearance rose significantly ahead of the one-sodded election in 2014 and most of the victims were leaders and activists of the opposition parties.

Non-government human rights organisations said more than 500 people became victims of enforced disappearance during the three terms of the Sheikh Hasina government. Bodies of many of them were found later; many were shown arrested in various cases; many were even released. According to ‘Mayer Daak,’ a platform for the families of those who have been victims of enforced disappearance, the whereabouts of 158 people are still unknown, and they handed over the list of these missing people to the director general of the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) on 18 August.

People concerned said Awami League created a culture of fear in the country through crossfire or gun battles, custodial deaths and enforced disappearance, and a section of the law enforcement agency members became disparate to do these tasks, and they were said to become ‘trigger happy.’

This was also reflected during the Student Against Discrimination movement when police used lethal weapons indiscriminately to subdue the movement. As a result, police face the wrath of people after the fall of the Awami League government on 5 August.

Former chief of police’s special branch (SB) Baharul Alam told Pothom Alo, “Once people were terrified of bullets. A culture of crossfire started through gunning down top terrorists and extremists after the formation of RAB, and people also appreciated it. The entire state system was involved in it. At one stage, police started crossfires to become popular, thus, members of law enforcement agencies have been trigger happy.”

He opined the firings over the last 20 years were the reasons behind the indiscriminate firing of police during the student-people movement this time.

* This report, originally published in the print edition of Prothom Alo, has been rewritten in English by Shameem Reza, Galib Ashraf and Hasanul Banna