Tue 22 Jan 2008
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate release:
22nd January 2007
Bangladesh: Pardons of teachers not enough
Amnesty International welcomed the pardon and release of three Dhaka university professors but said they should never have been charged in the first place.
Amnesty International considered the Dhaka University lectures to be prisoners of conscience and had been calling for their immediate and unconditional release. The professors were held without bail since last August on charges of inciting violence.
“Charges should never have been brought against the Rajshahi and Dhaka University professors in the first place,” said Irene Khan, Secretary General of Amnesty International.
“The arrest and prosecution of the Rajshahi and Dhaka University professors are illustrative of the manner in which emergency regulations are open to abuse in cases involving the right to peaceful protest.”
“The restrictions imposed through the Emergency Powers Rules (EPRs) exceed what is permissible under international law. The current rules and restrictions on freedom of expression, assembly and association are too widely framed and are being selectively applied.”
Amnesty International calls on the Caretaker Government to urgently review and amend the restrictions on rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association invoked under the state of emergency.
For further information, please see www.amnesty.org/en/for-media/press-releases/one-year-human-rights-bangladesh-under-state-emergency-20080110
William Little
Asia Pacific Press Officer
Amnesty International
International Secretariat
1 Easton Street
London WC1X 0DW
+44 (0) 207 413 5810
+44 (0) 7904 398 285
william.little@amnesty.org
January 22nd, 2008 at 12:01 pm
It is sad that the even in this issue, the teachers in DU are separated along party lines. BNP backed teachers panel failed to take a stand on this issue.
January 22nd, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Govt may be relieved of the tension or imminent anarchy, teachers got their demand fulfilled. Issues are done with.
What will happen to the restaurant and bus owners, who is going to settle their issues?
January 22nd, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Does this mean, future governments and authorities must capitulate whenever groups of DU teachers/students decide that they have been wronged!!
Is it not upto the court to decide whether one is guilty or not?
I however congratulate the protesting DU teachers/students for keeping their activities peaceful and not repeating the jalao porao.
I also give credit to the CTG/army for handling the matter pragmitically. Our past elected governments would have just closed the campus and deal with the matter with mass arrests and police violence.
January 22nd, 2008 at 1:29 pm
I agree that it is very, very sad that BNP-backed teacher’s panel suddenly backed off.
I wonder what will happen at the campuses now. Will the student movements fizzle out and die?
January 22nd, 2008 at 2:00 pm
Mamun,
the main point is not that. The main argument was why the trial was arbitrary and it picked up these four teachers. Also you need to ask since the murder of Cholesh Richil in the army camp was not investigated, then does it mean if the army commits murder, they will be unpunished?
January 22nd, 2008 at 4:43 pm
I think its funny. hahaha kind of funny. Chair thekey poray jawar moto funny.
I wish I could shout in some one’s ear…”RULE OF LAW”…”RULE OF LAW”…”RULE OF LAW”.
I wish I could celebrate freedom of our judicial system. I wish I could celebrate Hasan Arif’s appointment…I wish I could celebrate the 1/11 right now…
But I cant.
My sould is still alive. I wish I could kill it right now.
January 22nd, 2008 at 5:13 pm
It is good to see that the students were doing the peaceful demonstration rather than doing any vandalizing as usually they do, though I did not like the class boycott part. Seems teachers have started teaching the students how to practise peaceful protesting.
January 22nd, 2008 at 6:19 pm
BREAKING NEWS. (will be in tomorrow’s newspapers, but with DGFI censorship) Despite Sidr, rising food prices, the army has been able to ‘collect’ 25 crore for a new club house for the Army Golf Club (Kurmitola). This has been possible due to multiple ‘donors’. I attended their lavish party for this ironic cause. The reality at the party was that the donors had to donate.
The country is in an economic standstill and the Army feels like spending 25 CRORE, for their golf facilities!!
DU had to struggle for a 10 crore donation for 3 years, and finally found a non-government donor for their research center. But the Army wants to play golf.
Summit Group made a 3 crore donation to Sheikh Mujib foundation and are involved in a legal lawsuit for this. But it is suddenly not illegal to donate to the Army nowdays. How convenient.
January 23rd, 2008 at 12:22 pm
RE # 5
Siraj,
It is a fact that cars were burnt and properties were damaged during the student riot. Cars and buildings did not self destruct.
Groups and individuals were responsible for the destruction that took place and the law enforcement officials must find and punish those who were responsible for these actions.
The four teachers did raise the temparature and gave political statments during the rioting - their statements were broadcast by all News channels. To you the teachers’ actions may be justified but to many it is not, including myself. Many western democracies lock people up for inciting violence and Bangladesh should not be an exception.
No matter how flawed, people should allow the law and justice system to take it’s course. Many have suggested that even flawed democracy should be allowed to continue uninterrupted, so that it can mature and flaws are eventually addressed.
No one here is suggesting that army should be above the law but as in other democracies, army personnel are tried by military court and not by civilian courts.
The justice system is open to all, victims of crime can lodge their complaints in the court of law againts any person or group.
January 23rd, 2008 at 4:59 pm
(Teachers are same as father as my parents were teacher).
Once the emotion of the students and the army personnel were maturely handled by the authority, some other people in the name of protest carried out ransacking, looting.
This is not new in our culture.
The Leaders of the teachers also new this culture. At that time they could control the crowed which might stop this vandalism. Instead they instigated the students.(We are yet to see the text of Enquiry commission
Afterward, taking lesson from this incident, the other teachers and the students carried out silent and peaceful procession which actually we should be.
We must protest against wrong thing and promote good.We badly need a change in our attitude.
Corp Shihab
January 23rd, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Mamun,
would be nice to get more evidence based criticism from you.
You said:
Groups and individuals were responsible for the destruction that took place and the law enforcement officials must find and punish those who were responsible for these actions.
I agree wholeheartedly. But what I protest is arbitrarily picking up random people like they did with the teachers. Also I add that such spontaneous outburst are usually violent (Note: LA riots in 92 and French riot in 2005). They are best handled politically and through negotiations and not by simple dandabaji.
You said:
The four teachers did raise the temparature and gave political statments during the rioting - their statements were broadcast by all News channels.
They protested the police brutality in their campus and called for the withdrawal of SOE as I understand it.
police beating that injured the students of their campus.
http://www.thedailystar.net/photos/2007-08-21__front01.jpg
Also checking the older version of Daily star, I found this statement from Anwar Hossain on that day.
DU Teachers Association (Duta) General Secretary Prof Anwar Hossain said the incident was unwanted. “We hope the authorities will take proper and immediate steps.”
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=895.
There is nothing that looks that would raise the temperature.
Lastly, the enquiry commission report which would nipped the issue of who instigated the violence has not been published even after the specific request from the commission head.
Its really easy to hurl random accusation. But your wrath should be targetted towards why the real culprits were not unearthed or why the enquiry commission report was not published.
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=20243
A government formed one-member judicial probe commission in its report submitted to the chief adviser on November 15, said the three-day student protest was initially spontaneous, but later ‘a vested quarter and some politicians’ added fuel to it.
The commission of Justice Habibur Rahman Khan made a 28-point recommendation for ensuring congenial atmosphere in educational institutions, requesting the chief adviser to make the report public. But the report has not yet been made public in over two months.
Regarding military being tried in military court, it is not the case always if the victim is a civilian. There are instances where army personnel have been tried in civilian court. Even after, we have not heard of any steps being taken on Chalesh’s case in the military court either. Also what about the student who got beaten up in DU? The enquiry commission report on the death of chalesh richil case has not been published. Its great that you are showing your outrage for the bus burnings etc but its more important the adhering to rule of law starts from the top by the people who are powerful. Only then you will see it trickle down below. So let’s channel our anger towards that instead of putting out baseless accusations in pseudo name.
January 23rd, 2008 at 6:34 pm
Thats a very civilised quote from the prof, interesting that you should bring it up. I dont have access to ATN/NTV news archives, but anyone watching telly at the time would have seen him yelling his head off and waving his finger around. It would have been cute if the scenario wasnt so dangerous.
Which was not right and I hope he’s remorseful for it even though externally he kinda has to act defiant. Somebody should put it on youtube as ‘public’ evidence.
A lot of people made rash judjements too early to make sense during that time, it led to characteristic escalation that vultures cashed in on all over the place, in many fields of human activity. Dhaka had to shut down and reboot as a consequence. Perhaps thousands of student year’s were lost (uni being closed for months).
I dont see why BNP ‘teachers’ should be expected to dance to an AL war drum. Might have been interesting if they had. Its hard to know if it was because of cowardice(professional mobility, skeletons in closet etc) or general ‘cant be botheredness’ or just in the spirit of moving on and not being manipulated.
The episode has shown quite a lot about DUTA and media immaturity not to mention the lack of smooth, stable conciliatory forces in the whole society. Have the media been brought to account for some of their ludicrous peddling and partial coverage?
Has the random maniac who beat up a richshawallah, or the rikshawallah who was making off with debris from sat masjid road during the viral blossoming of anarchy in rayarbazar even been identified as a problem?
I hope the report reaches the right places and is acted upon well. You could probably squeeze it out of them if you tried and were directly relevant to the problem at hand. But I guess the HR centric politics of it is separate from the truth of it.
January 23rd, 2008 at 7:02 pm
#9
“Many western democracies lock people up for inciting violence and Bangladesh should not be an exception.”
The problem with this is that bd isnt a western democracy. Bits of it kinda worship the sweet blossoming of anarchy as its rightful contribution to its own democratic culture. Also people have generally extreme views on everything, this is celebrated as nourishing diversity, healthy debate and freemindedness.
Then theres the practical problem of there not being enough room in the jails.
Incitement is complicated to know. Someone might say something in a khutbah to express their solidarity with the beleagered in country X, another person might say a similar more local thing in the context of a riot growing around them. Authorities need to be practical about it, not political about it, or dumb.
Commentators are political, about it and will equate the HT vs Prothom alo event with the DU vs Army event and mutilate the scales of events and the important values. The gap is too huge in desh, the overlap is minimal.
January 23rd, 2008 at 7:10 pm
Fugstar,
Of course the fault lies with the human rights activist who could not “squeeze out” the report from the government rather than the govt who failed to publish this report of public interest. Notwithstanding such up-is-down logic, the delegation that I went to Dhaka with headed by Irene Khan pressed hard on the commission report on Cholesh Richil but both the government and chief of army were mum on it. Irene Khan has said that publicly in the press conference on Jan 10th. Now of course, it is our fault that we failed to get it out and not the other way around! Below is the excerpt:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/for-media/press-releases/one-year-human-rights-bangladesh-under-state-emergency-20080110
The case of Cholesh Richil is very well-known – government has informed us that the inquiry has been completed and that the army has taken some action following that. But despite our strong and repeated requests, the government gave us no assurance to publish the report or to take steps to prosecute those responsible. This is extremely disappointing given the commitment of this government to establish transparency and accountability.
January 23rd, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Mamun,
Got the facts now on military getting tried in civilian court. Based on this, Cholesh murder case should be tried in civilian court. Below from Amnesty:
Amnesty International believes that allegations of human rights abuses against personnel of the armed forces must be investigated and prosecuted by the civilian criminal justice system. Currently only rape and murder cases are referred to civilian courts. This should be expanded to include other serious human rights violations including in particular torture and ill treatment. I hope the military leadership will consider our recommendation seriously – we believe it will both ensure justice and instil confidence in the public that no one in Bangladesh is above the law.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/for-media/press-releases/one-year-human-rights-bangladesh-under-state-emergency-20080110
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:27 pm
We are not in the precense of the government at this point, the ‘why dont you focus your blame on them’ approach is misdirected. This is not my Hazrat Musa to Firaun moment, though it looks like you just had one.
What were the ranges of official receptions like to you when you went? did they get it, agree with you or give you lots of tea?
BD government-think is highly mistrustful of journos and HR folks unless they are their own tools. I hope we can agree on that. I share a little of their attitude, not because of the large amount of people i have killed and silenced with my bad breath, but because i dont think the rights based and freedom of speech analysis of everything under the sun is always the best one. I also worry about the buzzwordification and alienating transportation of these ideas. (maybe you do too?)
Someone going in there with more time with a practical university reform, social anarchy studies type focus would have done better…… I wouldn’t have expected them to submit to Amnesty and Drishtipat. (You didnt did you?) But congratulations for saying your thing. I didnt know about Rang Lai Mro.
All of my body feels that there needs to be a lot more trust before transparency can happen.
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:44 pm
oops. the report i am talking about is the dhaka riots one. double wirecrossing methinks due to mislabeling.
January 24th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
…pearls from the depths of the blogosphere…
January 25th, 2008 at 9:55 am
AsifS, BNP teachers were not the only ones playing party politics. Prof Hossain’s defiant stance is very inspiring. But it also contained fairly dubious history. He accused Ziaur Rahman of collaborating with Mushtaque for the murder of Khaled Musharraf, when his brother took the full responsibility (or credit, depending on the perspective) for the events of 6-7 November 1975.
But this is not necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps this is a sign that politics is about to return. Just as some folks get a kick out of the bosta pocha bitorko of shadhinotar ghoshona, others get their political thrills from dead president bashing. To each their own once politics returns.
Once politics returns we can go back to pushing for a better world, grabbing hold of things entire so that we can remould them to the heart’s desire.
January 25th, 2008 at 10:01 am
That speech was great for its sheer courage under fire. But it brought in a lot of historical issues which i am not sure was necessary. Can we open it up for discussion? Unfortunately, I don’t know enough about the Khaled Musharraf coup to merit a discussion. While the debate on the events may be unnecessary, but a teacher who is claiming higher moral standard than average must be held accountable in a higher standard for true depiction of history. He can not and should not indulge in “partisan truth” telling.
January 26th, 2008 at 10:24 am
AsifS, within a year of 1/11 we have multiple versions of that coup - did Maj Gen Masud break someone’s nose, was Lt Gen Hasan Mashhud present - and you want to have a discussion about who killed Khaled Musharraf. I’m afraid we’ll need to wait for someone like Mash to dig through the primary sources to tell the real facts. And even then it would be hard. Pakistani crackdown and Bangladeshi resistance led to an international crisis, so the world took notice. For the world media, November 1975 was just another series of tin pot generals shuffling chairs in a 3rd world basket case.
My knowledge is based on a bunch of books whose veracity I do not vouch for. I would note this though: Prof Hossain’s description of the events of 1975 are directly at odds with Col Taher’s accounts as reported in Lawrence Lifschultz’s Unfinished Revolution - in that account, 15 August massacre is described as a necessary end to an unjust rule and Khaled Musharraf is described as foreign (read Indian) agent whose murder is revolutionary justice.
Zia, Taher, or even Manzur have their partisan followers who twist and turn memories in incredible ways depending on the current political exigencies. But no one remembers that Khaled Musharraf took a bullet in the battle of Kasba, or masterminded the guerilla campaign inside Dhaka.
I think it’s Oscar Wilde who said: the only duty we have to history is to rewrite it.
January 26th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
Khaled Mosharraf Taher Zia issues have been discussed exhaustively in UV blog within he last two years.
http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2006/07/21/coloner-taher-khaled-mosharraf-atm-haider/
http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2006/07/24/colonel-taher-khaled-mosharraf-atm-haider-ii/
http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2006/05/31/a-freedom-fighter-and-a-visionery-leader/
January 26th, 2008 at 8:39 pm
The political speech of Dr. Anwar Hossain is very natural, coming from someone who is more a politician than a teacher. It is a pity, though not unnatural in an intoxicated country, that these teachers, who spend more time in politicking than in teaching, have been garlanded, as heroes, in the DU campus.
January 27th, 2008 at 6:08 am
#23
Ahbab, Dr. Hossain’s Teaching/Research CV is not too bad given the opportunity and scope at DU. Look at that before you comment. I am not sure of his performance as a mentor or in-class teacher. Do you have any direct experience on his teaching ability? Your comments sure sound like that.
January 27th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
Ahbab,
this is the problem if we try to be objective on our criticism. You guys jump into histrionics and throw out rash and random comments. As SC said, please look at his resume, before you make comments like that. More specifics and less generalizations please.
January 28th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Asif S,
I did not say anything about Dr. Anwar Hossain’s academic results, or teaching ability. I commented about his commitment to politics vis-a-vis teaching. For that, I did not need to look at his resume. Still, you have accused me of jumping ‘into histrionics’ and throwing ‘out rash and random comments’. It is a pity that with this type of criticism, you still claim that you ‘try to be objective’ in your criticism!!!
January 29th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Ahbab
Is CV the new measurement tool to judge a person? Then we need to think million times before criticising about the Dr. Fakhruddin, Dr Iftekhar or Dr Yunus as their CV’s are not less impressive than the Dr. Anwar :).
February 11th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
Interestingly similar incident. Will AI, rights activist and the ‘Conscious of the Nation’ speak up for the victims [hawkers] here ?
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=22933
Sources said a student named Bijon Saha first slapped a young hawker following an altercation over the price of a pair of sandals in front of Gauchhia Market.
Enraged by the matter, several nearby hawkers assaulted Bijon.
Being informed, some students from the DU went to the spot, ransacked several shops on the footpath and beat up hawkers.
February 11th, 2008 at 11:39 pm
E.H.
This has been discussed many many times in this blog before — the difference between human rights violation and law and order problem. I will try one more time: When a person violates another person’s right, its a crime and a law and order issue . Its a only a violation of human rights, if the government failed to take the complaints and failed to address victim’s rights to redress. Human rights violation occurs when the state violates a person’s rights.
This is exactly why you see HR organization’s speak up more loudly than usual when the rights violation is a perpetrated by any govt or state and by any individuals.
But yes, the HR organizations do not typically speak up for each individual cases. Logistically it is not possible.
But rather they speak up for establishing rule of law in any country so that individual rights are protected by the court and the state in such cases. So in this case, an HR activist will fault the government for not being able to protect the right of the hawker or the student who got beaten up.
As far as picking up DU teachers’ cases, they were 1. Violation of HR by the state and 2. Also sometimes high profile cases are picked up to show a larger problem with the system.
This is also the same reason when there is a lot more noise when there is a violation of right from the minority community. This happens in any country. Because the most vulnerable segment of the society deserves the greatest protection from the state. This is exactly why there are more noise in the US when a murder is considered a hate crime. To add to that when the government repeatedly fails to take action to protect the right of the minority when there is rampant abuse of their right, the HR activist will speak up against the government. Example: Norendra Modi in Gujarat and BNP-Jamat government during the post 2001 election and the Ahmadiya debacle.
I hope I could make the differences clear. If not, SR does a better job here:
http://www.drishtipat.org/blog/2007/08/28/conspiracy-theories-and-the-photo-that-rocked-the-boat/#comment-144507
February 12th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Asif S, point taken on the jurisdiction of rights organization. I believe my question is little misdirected.
What I find very interesting is this incident seems an almost complete reenactment of initial DU incident with role of the army/police played out by the students here. I wonder what is the take by individuals who self profess to be the conscious of the nation ?
We would want our national universities and professors to be the conscious of the nation but when these individuals keep silent on incidence like these [this is just an example] and the majority of other serious problems that is decaying the academic institutions and the healthy nurturing of students, I only see hypocrisy.