Sun 22 Jun 2008
BREAKING NEWS: As a result of hr campaign & press reports, all 4 members of UPDF were released from custody on the night of June 24th. Kudos to all activists who worked on this case.
On 12th anniversary of disappearance of Kalpana Chakma, new “events” in CHT. Where are Alakesh Chakma and 3 other Jumma activists, picked up by “plainclothes security forces”?
No charges have been filed, and whereabouts are unknown. Unidentified “security personnel” are also searching for HWF chairwoman Sonali Chakma. Last week, Sonali was a speaker at Kalpana Chakma memorial event at Dhaka University.
NEW AGE, June 22, 2008
Ethnic minority leader, 4 others picked up
Staff Correspondent . Chittagong
Plainclothesmen picked up five people of one of the ethnic minorities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, including Alakesh Chakma, a leader of Democratic Youth Forum, from Hathazari on Saturday noon.
Claiming to be members of law enforcing agencies, the plainclothesmen waylaid the CNG-run auto-rickshaw carrying Alakesh and four others at Hathazari when they were on their way back from Chittagong University at about noon, and took them away to an undisclosed location.
Dr Oni Bikash Chakma, Pahari Chhatra Parishad’s leader Pulak Chakma, Shantimay Chakma and another unidentified person were also in the auto-rickshaw along with Alakesh, who is also the husband of Sonali Chakma, president of the United People’s Democratic Front-sponsored Hill Womens’ Federation.
Friends and relatives of Alakesh said they could not trace their whereabouts till the filing of this report at 8:30pm yesterday. Mohammed Alamgir, officer-in-charge of Hathazari thana, said they had not received any complaint till Saturday afternoon in this regard.
UPDF members arrested from Chittagong
JOINT FORCES have arrested Alkesh Chakma, a central committee member of the Democratic Youth Forum, a front organisation of the United People’s Democratic Front (UPDF), from Hathazari, Chittagong.
Anther member of DYF, Pulok Chakma, and a paramedic student, Ani Bikash Chakma, were also arrested. The joint forces arrested them at 2 p.m. from house rented by Ani Bikash Chakma.
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:14 pm
So, who is to be accountable for the disappearance of those people? What is Bangladeshis doing to prevent it?
June 23rd, 2008 at 2:29 am
Where is Kalpana Chakma?
Where is Rupon Chakma?
Where is Sukesh Chakma?
Where is Monotosh Chakma?
Where is Samar Chakma?
Where is Alakesh Chakma?
Where is Oni Bikash Chakma?
Where is Shantimay Chakma?
Where is Pulok Chakma?
You still think these people have eloped to India due to a love tryst? The planned arson and lootings just by some poor landless Bengalis? The repeated gangrapes by frustrated service-men?
Try find out for yourself what is happening? Its impossible, you won’t be allowed to go there. For some, just talking and writing about it is putting their lives at risk. Amnesty has drawn attention to it: http://www.aiusaoc.org/irvine/cht/
Kalpana Chakma, Choles Ritchil, we will keep your memory alive. We owe it to Bangladesh, we owe it to humanity.
June 23rd, 2008 at 6:58 am
Advanced apology to the author if this ignites a ‘this regime vs past governments’ debate.
One of the unintended consequence of the post-1990 democracy in Bangladesh is the way CHT / ethnic minorities’ issues came into our radar. It manifested itself in a number of ways. This was manifest in activists/journalists/writers in Dhaka taking an interest in the matter. By the end of the 1990s, articles/reports in the mainstream media about the conflict was commonplace, as were debates in seminars etc. And even the supposed far right government of BNP-JI coalition didn’t stop the conversations generated by this awareness.
While positive, this was nevertheless an unintended consequence of democracy. Unintended because neither parties had any reason to put CHT on the agenda of the opinionmakers - there is no vote in it. Yes, both parties sought to end the armed conflict in the region. While AL successfully signed a peace accord, it was during the first Khaleda government that Bangladesh government signalled it wanted to end the ‘military solution’ there - Oli Ahmed claims to have begun talks with the Shanti Bahini in 1995. Politicians wanted to minimise the army’s role as part of the post-1990 demilitarisation. And it was the general democratic atmosphere - freedom of press and relative freedom of activism - that allowed this positive development.
And now, an unintended consequence of 1/11 is that we have re-embarked on a process of remilitarisation. If this happened in 2004, would the author have felt the necessity to use a pseudonym?
June 23rd, 2008 at 9:16 am
Jyoti,I wrote about this issue in 2004, and I did it under my own name. And now I use a pseudonym, because I am too afraid of some over-enthusiastic Major, Colonel, Subedar, Other Rank deciding that I needed to be taught a lesson and picks me up and smashes my legs.
Welcome to the world of 1/11. Logicat keeps telling us this is for our own good.
June 25th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
That’s great to hear.
But what ‘custody’ was it? Police?Army? Intelligence?
July 12th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
*chtnews.com
News No. 117/2008, June 25, 2008*
*Alakesh Chakma, Publication Secretary of the Democratic Youth Forum, was released yesterday after 3 days of captivity. The three others, arrested along with him, were also freed.*
Plainclothes security personnel arrested them on 21 May from Hathazari, Chittagong, and kept them incommunicado in detention until their release. Alakesh Chakma, who has just completed his Masters courses in Social Sciences from Chittagong University, was set free from Agrabad area of Chittagong city. He came to Chittagong to know his result of the exams. The security personnel released Ani Chakma on 24 June from Gate No. 2 of Chittagong University. He is a paramedic student of a private institute in Chittagong.
Pulok Chakma and Simon Chakma were released today. Pulok was in Chittagong for medical treatment for his wound sustained when he was attacked by a wild bore. Both of them hail from Kawkhali under Rangamati district.
After release Ani Chakma told chtnews.com that a man of mongoloid stock accompanied the security personnel during the arrest. He believes that there was ample evidence to suggest that the arrests were made after tip-off from a Jumma.
He said the plainclothes security personnel, who arrested them, spoke Chakma and Marma fluently and added that he was tortured during interrogation.
On the day they were arrested, security personnel also searched for Sonali Chakma, President of Hill Women’s Federation and wife of Alakesh Chakma, at her father’s residence at West Naranghia, Khagrachari.