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BANGLADESH
POLITICAL VIOLENCE ON ALL SIDES
The fierce struggle for power between
Bangladesh's main political parties has fostered a situation of lawlessness
and civil strife in which wanton acts of violence and intimidation by both
the former ruling party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), backed
by security forces, and the opposition parties, have become routine features
of the political process. While in power, the BNP deployed the police,
the paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles (BDR), and the army to counter the opposition's
two-year campaign of anti-government agitation, with grave human rights
abuses taking place in the process, including torture, arbitrary detention
and excessive and indiscriminate use of force in confrontations with demonstrators.
Both the BNP and the opposition parties, led by the Awami [People's] League,
have used crude "cocktail" bombs, knives, and guns against one another
and the police, causing scores of casualties. These abuses escalated in
the months leading up to and following the February 1996 elections, polls
that were rigged by the BNP despite an opposition boycott.
There is reason to believe that the political
violence may recur as the country's political parties prepare for new polls
on June 12, 1996 or after the outcome of the election becomes clear. Nothing
has been done since the discredited and violence-marred February election
to account for serious human rights abuses committed by Bangladesh's police,
army and other security forces. At the same time, neither the BNP nor the
Awami League has taken affirmative steps to ensure that their supporters
and party cadres desist from the kind of violence that characterized their
earlier political feuding. The head of an interim government formed when
Begum Khaleda Zia of the BNP finally stepped down on March 30, 1996 has
warned that a fair poll is possible only with the restoration of law and
order which, in turn, depends on the cooperation of the political parties.
In releasing
this report on the eve of the June 12 election, we hope to pressure party
leaders to hold their organized cadres accountable for acts of political
violence and take concrete steps to end such acts by immediately and permanently
disarming their youth and student wings. Party authorities should fully
cooperate with investigations and prosecutions of cadre members and supporters
responsible for murder, assault, arson, intimidation, destruction of property
and other crimes. Human Rights Watch calls upon all political parties to respect
the rights of citizens to freedom of peaceful assembly and association
guaranteed by international law.
President Biswas and the political parties should extend their full cooperation
to the caretaker government to ensure that meaningful and fair elections
take place on June 12.The
interim authority and the government formed pursuant to the June polls
must also ensure that police and members of other security forces act within
the law; law enforcement personnel who participated in or refused to prevent
violent attacks, or abused their authority in any way during the recent
political crisis, must be brought to justice. In his capacity as head of
the Defense Ministry, President Biswas should demonstrate the same commitment
with respect to the armed forces, and make certain that army personnel
who have committed human rights violations are punished for their actions
and not granted further career promotions.
The international
community also has a role to play in pressing the chief contenders for
power -- the BNP and the Awami League -- to disarm their militant cadres
to allow for a free poll. At
the annual meeting of the donor consortium for Bangladesh, scheduled for
July 1996, donor countries and the World Bank should urge whichever party
comes to office pursuant to the June poll to impartially investigate all
reports of abuse and violence and punish the perpetrators as required by
law. Whichever party attains power must also be prepared to ensure that
the police and other security forces consistently abide by international
human rights law.
Human Rights Watch has concluded that
in the election-related violence, the BNP, the security forces and the
opposition parties all violated their obligations under domestic and international
law. Specifically, the election-related violence is the sort of situation
addressed by the Declaration of Minimum Humanitarian Standards adopted
by a group of experts in Turku-Abo, Finland in 1990. The Declaration applies
to situations of "internal violence, disturbances, tensions and public
emergencies" and specifically holds not only governments but "all persons,
groups and authorities, irrespective of their legal status" responsible
for protecting individuals against, among other things, murder, torture,
mutilation, rape, cruel and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment,
pillage, deliberate deprivation of access to necessary food, drinking water
or medicine, and unacknowledged detention. The Declaration is meant to
codify many existing international law standards and to clarify their applicability
to "gray area" situations not adequately covered by peacetime human rights
law but that also fall short of the definition of armed conflict. Its importance
derives not only from the recognition enjoyed by the jurists who drafted
it, but by the fact that it was endorsed by the U.N. Subcommission on Prevention
of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities in October 1994 and by the
Budapest review meeting of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in
Europe in December 1994. The U.N. Commission on Human Rights has asked
governments to comment on it with a view to its adoption soon. For these
reasons, although this Declaration is not a binding instrument at this
time, Human Rights Watch believes that it constitutes an authoritative
guideline by which to judge the conduct of governments and non-state actors
in situations of civil strife.
Both ruling party and opposition leaders
and supporters have violated these minimum standards. Both sides have used
and sometimes armed their youth wings to perpetrate violence against opponents.
Just before the February polls, gun battles and other armed confrontations
broke out frequently in the streets of Dhaka, the capital, and other cities.
Several newspaper offices were attacked in the main cities, and journalists
and news photographers reporting on the violence were assaulted and threatened.
Mobs organized by opposition leaders in Chittagong engaged in arson attacks
that destroyed millions of dollars worth of property and endangered dozens
of individuals.
Although acts of intimidation and violence
by the opposition clearly required a government reaction, the response
by the police and other security forces to most of these acts of violence
was both disproportionate to the threat and partisan. Although the police
and paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) responded to serious armed clashes
with tear gas and rubber bullets, on some occasions they also fired indiscriminately
at demonstrators in violation of the U.N. Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement
Officials and the U.N. Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms
by Law Enforcement Officials. Subsequent to such clashes, the police and
paramilitary also resorted to indiscriminate arrests of suspected opposition
supporters, in some cases arresting children. On the pretext of searching
for illegal arms, the police conducted a brutal raid at Dhaka University,
beating and arresting minority students, many of whom were not politically
active. The police also assaulted journalists who attempted to report on
or photograph police abuses, and while they arrested opposition activists
for acts of violence, they failed to arrest BNP militants who had engaged
in similar crimes. During an arms recovery drive ahead of the February
election, the army engaged in indiscriminate beating of villagers, arbitrary
arrest and torture.
Two of the most serious incidents of brutality
by the security forces were a military raid on Charsayedpur village in
Narayanganj district in which army troops terrorized the entire village
and a police/BDR raid on Jagannath Hall, a Dhaka University dormitory for
religious minority students, in which approximately 150 students were injured.
During the Charsayedpur raid -- carried out on February 4 in retaliation
for an attack by some villagers on a small group of military personnel
the previous day -- army troops stormed over a hundred houses, destroying
property and indiscriminately beating villagers. Three villagers were arbitrarily
detained, and one of them was severely tortured in custody. The police/BDR
raid on Jagannath Hall, a stronghold of the Awami League's student front,
the Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL), followed a shoot-out on the university
campus between BCL activists and the police. Police detained ninety-five
students after forcibly entering student rooms and dining halls, beating
students with rifle butts and lathis
(wooden batons), and cursing them with anti-Hindu epithets. The government
failed to hold abusive forces accountable for illegal actions.
The government also initiated a spate
of arrests of key opposition figures in an attempt to dampen the opposition's
anti-government agitation, which had intensified in the wake of the February
1996 election denounced as "farcical" by Awami League leader Sheikh Hasina.
Anwar Hossain Manju and Moudud Ahmed of the Jatiya Party and Mohammad Nasim
and Matia Choudhury of the Awami League were arrested on February 24. Another
two leaders, Abdul Kader Mollah of the Jamaat-e-Islami and Tofayel Ahmed
of the Awami League were picked up on February 27. All six, who were held
for about two weeks and released, were arrested under the Special Powers
Act of 1974 (1) which authorizes the government
to detain any person for up to four months without charge or trial. Police
reportedly raided the homes of Awami League leaders Amir Hossain Amu, Abdur
Razzak and Suranjit Sengupta on February 24 but were unable to locate them.
Also in February, at least one journalist was arrested and detained for
over a month under the Special Powers Act.
Since mid-1994 opposition parties led
by the Awami League had waged their political campaign and street agitation
to force then prime minister Begum Khaleda Zia to hold early parliamentary
polls under a neutral interim government. The success of the opposition's
political campaign depended in significant measure on acts of violence
and intimidation by members of its youth and student wings. All the major
political parties have well-armed youth wings and student fronts whose
criminal activities are tolerated and even encouraged by party leaders.
The BNP sponsors the Jatyabadi Jubo [Youth] Dal and the Jatyabadi Chhatra
[Student] Dal (JCD) while the Bangladesh Jubo League and the Bangladesh
Chhatra League (BCL) are affiliated with the Awami League. During the long-running
stand off between the opposition and the government, militant cadres of
all political parties engaged in factional fighting, sabotaged their rivals'
political rallies and meetings, and carried out bomb and arson attacks
on party bureaus, newspaper offices, government buildings, and polling
centers.
In their efforts to bring pressure to
bear on the government, opposition political parties organized a series
of strikes all over the country, frequently relying on intimidation and
violence to keep people and transport off the roads. The opposition also
orchestrated massive street demonstrations, marches and sieges of government
offices that frequently turned violent, leading to loss of life, thousands
of casualties, and extensive property damage. The port city of Chittagong,
whose powerful mayor is an influential Awami League leader, suffered widespread
destruction at the hands of opposition protesters; on February 28, 1996,
marauding crowds rampaged through the city ransacking offices, gutting
buildings and damaging vehicles in protest at the mayor's arrest under
the SPA earlier that day. (The mayor, A.B.M. Mohiuddin Ahmed, was released
on March 11.)
The press was victimized by all sides
during the prolonged political stalemate and related disturbances. Newspaper
offices were attacked by partisans of all stripes, journalists were imprisoned
by the government, and reporters and news photographers on the job were
frequently beaten up by the police or by political activists with various
affiliations. Newspaper editors reported stiff pressure to engage in self-censorship
from all sides. Certain papers loyal to the Awami League told Human Rights
Watch that they were intimidated into self-censorship by their own party.
This
report is based on an investigative mission to Bangladesh by two Human
Rights Watch/Asia researchers in April and May 1996. It documents a few
of the many instances of abuse by police, army and other security forces
that took place between January and March 1996. The report also documents
violent actions by activists of major political parties that were tolerated
or encouraged by senior party officials.
Human Rights Watch makes the following
recommendations for action to be taken prior to June 12 by all of Bangladesh's
political parties, President Biswas, the caretaker government and the international
community, as well as after June 12 by the government to address the incidence
of human rights violations in the country.
To All Political Parties
. Political parties should hold
their own cadres accountable for acts of political violence and take concrete
steps to end such acts by immediately and permanently disarming their student
and youth wings and bring to justice members known to have participated
in acts of murder, assault, arson, intimidation, destruction of property
and other crimes. Political parties should fully cooperate with investigations
and prosecutions of those responsible for criminal acts.
. Political parties should desist
from engaging in violent acts of political protest that contravene the
Declaration of Minimum Humanitarian Standards, endorsed by the U.N. Subcommission
on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities in October
1994, and Bangladesh law.
. Political parties should fully
respect the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and association, as
described under Articles 21 and 22 of the International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights (ICCPR) and ensure that fair elections take place
on June 12 in accordance with Article 25 of the ICCPR and Article 21 of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
To the Future Elected Government
. The government should ensure
that the police and paramilitary forces are instructed in non-lethal methods
of crowd control, in accordance with the Basic Principles on the Use of
Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials, and those methods should
be made available. The government should also institute mechanisms to review
such training on a regular basis.
. The government should require
that police register all criminal cases, regardless of the political affiliation
of the perpetrators, and enforce this regulation through appropriate disciplinary
measures. During periods of heightened political tension, the government
should establish a non-party civilian board, which would include representatives
for a range of political groups and headed by a magistrate or other competent
judicial authority, mandated to review police registers and conduct spot
inspections of lock-up and jail facilities.
. The government should institute
measures to end the practice of torture. At a minimum these should include
swift prosecutions and punishments for all members of the police, paramilitary
forces and army responsible for torture; frequent inspections of all lock-ups
by judicial magistrates; and the elimination of all temporary detention
centers. Detainees should be allowed immediate access to lawyers, family
members and medical care.
.
The government should bring to justice members of all state security forces,
including the police, BDR and army, who participated in or refused to prevent
violent acts or abused their authority in any way during their deployment
to restore civic peace in the country. The steps the government has taken
in this regard should be made public.
. The government should investigate
and prosecute in a nonpartisan and even-handed manner all acts of politically-motivated
violence and intimidation committed during the recent political crisis.
. The government should repeal
the Special Powers Act of 1974 and immediately review the cases of all
those detained under it with a view to releasing them.
. The government should demonstrate
its commitment to human rights by ratifying or acceding to the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
To President Biswas
. In his capacity as head of the
Defense Ministry, President Biswas should ensure that members of the armed
forces are held accountable for abusive actions. He should set up an independent
and impartial review board to make certain that personnel who have committed
human rights violations are not granted career promotions.
To the Caretaker Government
. The caretaker government should
immediately release all persons arbitrarily arrested and detained during
the opposition's anti-government agitation.
. The caretaker government should
order a prompt and independent inquiry into cases pending against Jagannath
Hall students, Charsayedpur villagers, journalists and others indiscriminately
rounded up during the recently-concluded security crackdown and order the
withdrawal of all unwarranted and unfounded charges. The findings of the
inquiry should be made public.
To the International Community
. The international community should
press both parties with aspirations to govern the county -- the BNP and
the Awami League -- to disarm their militant cadres and to be prepared,
if elected to office, to fully investigate all reports of violence and
abuse and punish those responsible as required by law. These concerns should
also be forcefully raised by donor countries and the World Bank at the
annual meeting of the donor consortium for Bangladesh scheduled for July
1996.
Political violence has marred Bangladesh's
history as an independent nation. In its twenty-five years of existence
the country has experienced nineteen reported coup attempts, two full-scale
military takeovers and two assassinations of supreme leaders. The area
today known as Bangladesh was part of the British dominion of India from
1772 to 1947 when it became the eastern wing of an independent Pakistan.
In December 1971, after a bloody nine-month war with West Pakistan, Bangladesh
became a sovereign nation. Independence leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman emerged
as the new country's first president and, later, prime minister after his
Awami League won an overwhelming mandate in a general election in 1973.
Mujib, along with most of his family, was killed in a coup led by young
army officers on August 15, 1975. A turbulent period followed with the
assassination of other political leaders and further coups until November
1975, when Deputy Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Ziaur Rahman consolidated power
as chief martial law administrator of Bangladesh. In 1979 Zia became president
as leader of the BNP -- which he had founded the previous year -- and he
remained at the helm until he was assassinated in an abortive military
coup in 1981. (2) The country was rocked
by yet another coup in 1982 that brought Army Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Hossain
Mohammad Ershad to power. In 1984 Ershad launched the Jatiya [National]
Party and ruled as president until he was toppled in 1990 by a united opposition
movement led by the BNP and the Awami League.
In 1991 parliamentary democracy was restored following a legislative
election hailed as the country's first fairly held poll.
(3) The widow of Ziaur Rahman and leader of the BNP, Begum Khaleda
Zia, formed a government with the support of the rightist Islamic party,
the Jamaat-e-Islami; the Awami League, headed by Mujib's daughter Sheikh
Hasina, became the largest opposition party followed by Ershad's Jatiya
Party.
Bangladesh's incipient democracy soon ran into trouble, however, as
the BNP and an alliance of the major opposition parties -- including the
Jamaat-e-Islami, which withdrew its initial support from the government
-- became involved in a bitter and frequently violent political standoff
that devastated the economy and culminated in Zia's ouster after two strife-torn
years. The crisis began when the opposition MPs (predominantly from the
Awami League, Jatiya Party, Jamaat-e-Islami and some marginal parties)
walked out of parliament on March 1, 1994. The walk-out was triggered by
the parliament speaker's refusal to table for discussion the opposition's
corruption allegations against several cabinet ministers and by a skeptical
comment by Information Minister Nazmul Huda impugning the Muslim credentials
of the main opposition.
The row deepened when a BNP candidate won a key parliamentary by-election
on March 20 in the Magura (2) constituency, made vacant by the death of
the Awami League incumbent who had held the seat for four consecutive terms.
The poll was marred by violence between supporters of rival candidates
and by the opposition's allegations of massive vote-rigging by the ruling
party. The by-election had strategic significance for both the Awami League
and the BNP as it came on the heels of the BNP's stunning loss to the Awami
League of the two key mayoralties of Dhaka and Chittagong in local elections.
Opposition leaders demanded a new vote under a caretaker authority, declaring
that the flawed Magura election proved that the BNP government could not
be trusted to hold free and impartial polls.
The fallout over Magura became the basis for the opposition parties'
intensified accusations of corruption and incompetence against the BNP
government and for their related demand that Begum Zia hand over power
to a neutral interim government to oversee early legislative elections.
Begum Zia consistently labeled the opposition's call "unconstitutional
and undemocratic." The opposition's prolonged boycott of parliament and
simultaneous anti-government agitation led to legislative paralysis, economic
disruption and civil strife that, according to Begum Zia, derailed her
government's efforts to liberalize and reform the economy and attract much-needed
foreign investment. On December 28, 1994, opposition legislators resigned
en masse from parliament in a bid to heighten pressure, after the collapse
of a last-minute compromise deal over procedures for the next election
due in 1996. (4) The departing MPs also
vowed to boycott, and hence delegitimize, any future by-elections held
by the government to fill their recently vacated seats.
On November 25, 1995, when it became clear that the opposition would
not participate in by-elections for over 140 parliamentary seats planned
for December 15, President Abdur Rahman Biswas dissolved parliament on
the advice of Prime Minister Zia, whom he asked to remain in office as
head of the executive branch. Fresh legislative polls were announced for
February 15, 1996, within the constitutionally mandated ninety-day period
for new elections following the dissolution of parliament. Opposition parties
pledged to boycott the polls unless Zia resigned beforehand; they stepped
up their campaign of strikes and street protests to force the government
to accede to their demands. As the February polls approached, the political
deadlock led to widespread human rights violations at the hands of supporters,
youth wings and student fronts of all political parties as well as the
police, paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) -- both under the control
of the Home Affairs Ministry -- and the army, which had been called in
by the Election Commission to retrieve illegal arms ahead of the election.
At a protest rally in front of the Jatiya Press Club in Dhaka prior to
the election, a speaker from the Awami League warned, "Anyone who goes
to vote will come back dead." On and immediately before election day, several
hundred polling stations across the country were gutted by opposition militants.
The polls themselves were marred by violence among rival political factions,
intimidation of voters, and attacks on polling centers by opposition activists
and credible allegations against the ruling party of vote-rigging in the
uncontested election. Nationwide, an estimated sixteen people were killed
and 500 injured in violent incidents over the two weeks leading up to the
polls, forcing authorities to postpone voting in several areas. The BNP
won all but two of the 207 seats for which results were declared; new voting
was ordered in the remaining ninety-three constituencies because of various
irregularities and charges of vote-tampering against the government. The
opposition, led by Sheikh Hasina, declared the election "illegal" and "farcical"
and organized strikes and protests throughout the country in an effort
to create economic and political pressures to force a new election on its
terms. After several effective "non-cooperation" drives in the wake of
the February election, the opposition on March 9 declared an indefinite
non-cooperation movement that lasted, except for a few minor interruptions,
until the end of the month, bringing the economy to the brink of collapse.
The country's emerging export-oriented garment-manufacturing industry suffered
a heavy toll from lost production and from the closure of Chittagong port.
Moreover, in the first three months of 1996 alone, the fighting among supporters
of rival parties, encounters between protestors and the police, BDR and
army, and bomb and arson attacks by various political groups led to an
estimated 120 deaths, thousands of casualties and widespread property damage.
Zia was sworn in as prime minister for a second term on March 19 and
proceeded to appoint her cabinet while the opposition's non-cooperation
movement gathered momentum. Meanwhile, on March 26, the newly elected parliament
enacted the thirteenth constitutional amendment bill paving the way for
the appointment of an interim caretaker government. On March 28 President
Abdur Rahman Biswas signed the bill into law, (5)
as thousands of civil servants staged a sit-in at the main government secretariat
building in Dhaka where the civil administration is centered, demanding
a resolution of the political crisis through the installation of a caretaker
authority. On March 30, as the opposition prepared to orchestrate a siege
of the presidential palace by thousands of supporters, President Biswas
dissolved the newly-elected legislature and, as Zia stepped down, appointed
ex-Chief Justice Habibur Rahman as chief adviser to head an interim government
that is now poised to preside over fresh national elections on June 12,
1996. Already, however, the sacking of army chief Lt. Gen. Abu Saleh Mohammad
Nasim by President Biswas on May 20, allegedly as a consequence of Nasim's
refusal to accept the forced early retirement of two senior army officers,
has triggered new fears and doubts about Bangladesh's return to democracy.
As this report went to print, it was unclear whether rising political tensions
surrounding the army shake-up would disrupt plans for the June 12 election.
Despite charges of favoritism by both the BNP and Awami League, the
measures enacted by Chief Adviser Habibur Rahman and his staff to date
appear designed to prevent the abuses that accompanied the previous election:
a new election commissioner has been appointed, and the police and civil
administration have been reshuffled. However, the chief adviser cannot
conduct a fair poll without the cooperation of the political parties, which
have taken no steps as yet to account for past acts of violence by their
cadres or to ensure that they abide by the law in the future. Unless all
the political parties commit themselves to holding their supporters and
organized cadres accountable for acts of violence and intimidation in the
run-up to and after the elections, the potential for renewed politically
motivated violence remains strong. President Abdur Rahman Biswas, who retains
control of the Defense Ministry under the thirteenth constitutional amendment,
must demonstrate the same commitment with respect to the armed forces.
Although this report documents but a fraction of the abuses that occurred
from January to March 1996 in the context of the government-opposition
political feuding, Human Rights Watch was able to investigate a number
of the most serious incidents and determine the general pattern of criminal
acts and human rights violations that characterized this period.
IV. VIOLATIONS BY THE ARMY AROUND THE FEBRUARY ELECTIONS Village of Charsayedpur, Narayanganj District: February 3 and 4,
1996
On February 3, at about 3:30 p.m., an army jeep with a uniformed driver
and four plainclothes personnel arrived at the village of Charsayedpur
in Narayanganj district, near Dhaka. In their custody they had a man suspected
of murder who had reportedly confessed to having associates and an arms
cache in the village. The suspect led the military personnel -- who were
conducting arms recovery drives in many areas in the run-up to the impending
February 15 legislative elections -- to the house of one of his associates,
who fled at their approach shouting for help. A group of villagers gathered
in response to his cries, and in an ensuing violent confrontation the army
personnel were badly injured. A press release issued by army headquarters
on February 8 stated that three injured personnel were later admitted to
the Combined Military Hospital in critical condition.
According to eyewitnesses, at about 3:45 a.m. on February 4, a convoy
of approximately twenty army vehicles carrying at least 200 uniformed soldiers
armed with guns and lathis arrived at the village. The soldiers conducted
indiscriminate raids in the Purbapara, Uttarapara and Madyapara sections
of the village for about five hours, terrorizing the villagers. They took
three villagers into custody, rounded up and interrogated scores of others,
beat and injured at least 200 residents, including women and children,
and raided over one hundred houses.
The Purbapara section was the worst affected; about thirty-three houses
in this part of the village were completely ransacked and looted. Household
fixtures, furniture and articles were destroyed or badly damaged, and stores
of rice and grains were mixed with sand.
The army personnel detained three villagers: Yusuf Ali, a student of
about eighteen years of age, Abdur Rahim, a laborer, and Inamul Haq, a
truck driver, both in their thirties. Human Rights Watch interviewed Abdur
Rahim and Inamul Haq in Charsayedpur village.
Abdur Rahim
When the army contingent arrived at Charsayedpur, Abdur Rahim was finishing
his sehri (a pre-dawn meal eaten during the fasting month of Ramadan).
As he set out for the village mosque to offer the fajr or dawn prayer,
he saw about twenty-five soldiers in the street outside his home. When
they saw him, they roughed him up, blindfolded him, dragged him to the
road and forced him into a truck. After some time Rahim was driven to an
undisclosed location, where he was beaten, tortured and kept blindfolded
and in incommunicado detention for five days. He was repeatedly asked if
he was among the villagers who had attacked the plainclothes army personnel
on February 3. When he denied his involvement in the incident, he was interrogated
about the identity of the attackers and asked if he knew anything about
illegal arms stored in the village. During the first day of his detention,
Rahim was punched on the head, kicked and beaten with lathis on the soles
of his feet and given electric shock treatment at least four times. He
was made to sit in an electrified chair; when the chair was activated his
whole body would shake and convulse violently, and he would lose consciousness.
The soldiers also used pliers to pinch his flesh and squeeze his finger
tips, causing him excruciating pain. After the first day of detention the
torture ceased, but the beatings continued; he was beaten with lathis three
times a day for the duration of his detention.
After five days, Rahim became seriously ill: he began vomiting blood
and was unable to eat or to move without help. The bones at the back of
his right hand were broken, and he had bruises all over his body. At this
point he was shifted to Narayanganj Police Station, where his blindfold
was finally removed, and his family, who had been unable to discover his
whereabouts until then, were able to visit him. After two days in the police
lock-up, Rahim was taken to the local courthouse and then to a doctor.
He was then returned to the court lock-up for four days before being released
on bail. After his release, he was immediately hospitalized at his own
expense for eight days. He received blood transfusions and, his hand was
put in a plaster cast. When Human Rights Watch interviewed him in April,
Rahim still suffered from pain in his knees and could not sit for long
periods or walk without assistance for any distance, which curtailed his
ability to work as a laborer.
Inamul Haq
When he heard a knock on his door between 4:30 and 5:00 a.m. on February
4, Inamul Haq was not aware that a clash had occurred between some of the
villagers and military personnel the previous afternoon. As a truck driver,
he had been away on a road trip. He opened the door to two uniformed soldiers
armed with rifles and lathis. They asked him to accompany them to meet
their "captain" who was present at Charsayedpur Primary School No. 6. When
he got there, he found forty villagers already gathered there and a steady
of stream of others being brought in. The soldiers interrogated all of
them about the villagers involved in the February 3 beating of the plainclothes
army personnel. Eventually almost all of the villagers were released. Haq
was detained because a soldier said he recognized him from the incident.
Blindfolded, his hands tied behind his back, Haq was thrown into the back
of a truck and driven to an undisclosed location. Rahim and Yusuf Ali,
the two other detainees, were in the same truck.
On reaching their destination the three were kept in the same room.
Haq was the first of the three to be beaten. His blindfold was removed
once when he was taken to the toilet, and he was then taken to a different
room in which five soldiers, officers and sipahis (enlisted men),
were waiting. One of the officers showed Haq a picture of Daulat Husain,
a member of the local Union Parishad (local government unit) and asked
questions about him. Haq was also shown photographs of other villagers
and interrogated about them; the photographs had been seized from homes
during the army raid. During the questioning, Haq was kicked in the stomach
at times. Finally, the soldier who had accused Haq of participating in
the February 3 attack on the army personnel retracted his accusation. The
officer ordered that Haq not be beaten further. He was blindfolded again,
and with his hands tied behind his back, he was tied to a pole and made
to stand the rest of the day. After several hours, the blindfold was removed,
and in the evening he was allowed to sit. He remained tied through the
night. The next morning, he was released. The officer on duty gave him
Tk.100 ($2.50) and hired an auto-rickshaw to take him home. When Haq left
the detention center he saw that it was located within the premises of
the Saidabad office of the Dhaka City Corporation (the municipality).
The army filed criminal charges with Narayanganj Police Station against
Rahim, Haq and Yusuf Ali as well as a few other villagers for obstructing
and assaulting military personnel. The soldiers responsible for the raid,
however, were not punished in any way, and indeed, the army never publicly
admitted wrongdoing in the incident. The soldiers responsible for beating
and torturing Rahim, Haq and Yusuf Ali have also not been prosecuted.
According to the February 7 issue of the Dhaka-based newspaper, the
Daily Star, on the evening of February 6 three jeeps and a truck carrying
army and paramilitary personnel patrolled the village for about two hours,
spreading fresh panic in the village. Villagers told Human Rights Watch/Asia
that a large segment of the village population had abandoned their homes
to take refuge with relatives elsewhere for fear of further army sweeps.
The villagers began returning a week later, after assurances from the district
administration that it was safe for them to do so. By way of compensation,
the district commissioner for the area distributed a sari and a
lungi (sarong) to each household.
V. CAMPUS VIOLENCE All the major political parties in Bangladesh organize and support activist
and militant youth and student wings. These groups generally have access
to firearms but also widely utilize petrol bombs, molotov cocktails and
various kinds of crude hand-made bombs made of gunpowder, shrapnel and
ground glass, hockey sticks, wooden rods and knives of all kinds. It is
not uncommon for college and university campuses to be the location of
shoot-outs and running gun battles with automatic weapons between rival
student political factions, and educational institutions are frequently
forced to close down on account of such outbreaks of violence. Political
parties have traditionally relied, as exemplified in the recent conflict,
on their student cadres to throw their weight behind party campaigns using
violence and intimidation if necessary.
Bangladesh's security forces also have a history of arbitrary attacks
on students in colleges and universities. The police attack on Jagannath
Hall, described in detail below, targeted students belonging to religious
minorities; the vast majority of Jagannath Hall students are Hindus, the
remainder are tribals (6), Christians and
Buddhists. The religious minorities of Bangladesh as a rule tend to support
the Awami League.
Jagganath Hall Incident: January 31, 1996
On January 31, 1996, some 150 students were injured and about ninety-five
arrested as police, backed by BDR, raided Jagannath Hall, Dhaka University's
dormitory for religious minority students and a stronghold of the BCL.
Approximately thirty students were hospitalized as a result of the police
attack. The provost and house tutors of Jagannath Hall resigned in protest
against the attack. According to newspaper reports the Vice Chancellor
of Dhaka University, Professor Emazuddin Ahmad, confirmed that the police
had the university's permission to conduct the raid.
(7)
The police raid followed an exchange of fire between BCL and JCD factions
on the university campus. The clashes between the rival student fronts
were sparked by disagreements over the impending visit to the Bangla Academy,
adjacent to the campus, by then Prime Minister Khaleda Zia to inaugurate
an annual month-long book fair. BCL student activists had launched a campaign
to thwart the prime minister's proposed visit while JCD members had vowed
to resist all moves to prevent Zia from coming. Fighting between the two
groups broke out when BCL activists attempted to hoist a black flag on
the Bangla Academy premises. Around 12:30 p.m the police intervened and
traded fire with BCL militants; the raid on Jagannath Hall began between
2:30 and 3:00 p.m. purportedly to apprehend BCL militants who had reportedly
taken refuge there.
Police broke the main gates of the Hall (8)
and burst into students' rooms and the Hall canteens firing rubber bullets
and beating and rounding up students. Several rooms were ransacked and
looted. Some students attacked the police with sticks and stones, but many
students were taken by surprise at the brutality of the police raid. Several
canteen workers and guests of students who happened to be on the premises
were also beaten severely and detained. The police used epithets against
the Hindu and tribal students, calling them suarer bacha (son of
a pig) and malauner bacha (son of an infidel). The police also reprimanded
students in the canteens, most of whom were Hindus and some Christian and
Buddhist, for eating lunch during Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting.
The students rounded up from Jagannath Hall were detained under section
54 of the Bangladesh Code of Criminal Procedure, which permits arrests
without warrant or magisterial order. (9)
The arrested students were kept overnight in Ramna Police Station in
a cramped and fetid holding cell. The next afternoon they were taken to
a court lock-up where approximately thirty-seven students were released
on bail. The remaining students, about fifty-four in number, were moved
to Dhaka Central Jail. On February 6 all but fifteen of the students were
released on bail. The last batch of fifteen students, detained under the
Special Powers Act, were not released until April 2, after the fall of
the Zia government. At the time this report went to press, charges remained
pending against almost all of the students, who were required to report
to the court once a month.
Human Rights Watch interviewed several students injured and detained
during the police raid on Jagganath Hall. For reasons of security, only
their initials are used.
RS
RS, twenty-three years old and a first-year master's student, stated
that at some time after 2:00 p.m. on January 31 he saw, from the verandah
outside his room, about 100 uniformed and plainclothes policemen gathered
outside the main entrance to Jagannath Hall. He heard the police beating
and kicking on the grilled entrance gate until it gave way. He then heard
the police breaking the doors of students' rooms and students crying and
shouting, "Don't beat us." Frightened, RS went into his room and closed
the door. Three of his roommates were also in the room. When the police
reached his door, he was too frightened to open it. RS told Human Rights
Watch/Asia:
The police then kicked the door open, and five policemen came into the
room. They beat one of my roommates before turning to me. They ignored
my pleas and assurances that I was not involved in politics. They hit me
with a heavy lathi on my shoulder blades; they tried to beat me on my head
but I blocked the blows with my arms. Consequently my arms and shoulders
got badly beaten, cut up and swollen. Four policemen beat me simultaneously,
on my back, front, left and right sides -- I was surrounded. The police
kept asking me to bring out the arms, guns and revolvers in my possession,
but I had none. The police dragged me and two of my roommates down the
stairs by our collars. My third roommate managed to slip under a bed and
hide. A crowd of students was gathered outside the hall, many of the students
were crying, including me. The police stuffed us into two police vans,
we were jammed in, I could hardly breathe. It was suffocating. We were
taken to Ramna Police Station, where we were put into two cells. There
were about forty-five people in my cell. The condition of the cell was
horrible. There was human excrement and urine in the cell, and a terrible
smell, very little light, a tiny window and only a little corner to use
as a bathroom.
At 3:30 p.m. the following day the students were taken to a court lock-up,
and later RS and some fifty-three others were shifted to Dhaka Central
Jail. They were kept in a temporary holding cell, the amadani kokho,
for six or seven days after which RS was granted bail. According to RS,
conditions at the amadani kokho, although uncomfortable, were a huge improvement
on Ramna police station.
AT
AT, aged twenty-four, a fourth-year law student, told Human Rights Watch/Asia
that at about 2:45 p.m. on January 31, he was on his way back to his room
after lunching at one of the Hall's canteens when he saw police break down
the East Gate of the campus, near Jagannath Hall, and enter the compound.
He saw the police with guns drawn and heard the sound of firing. Afraid,
he returned to the canteen and met up with his friends. Soon after, tear
gas filled the canteen and the police could be seen outside. When the canteen
manager went to close the door of the canteen, the police fired rubber
bullets at him; he started bleeding above one of his eyes. A little later
three plainclothes men carrying shotguns and revolvers along with some
uniformed policemen came into the canteen. The plainclothes men cursed
the students in the canteen and had the uniformed policemen search them.
They threw plates of food off the tables and shouted, "This is the month
of Ramadan. Why are you taking meals? You should fast this month." AT told
Human Rights Watch/Asia:
The uniformed policemen started beating the students and even the canteen
boys with lathis; some of my friends were severely beaten. I ran to the
far corner of the room to save my back. A plainclothes man and a uniformed
policeman came and tied my hands to those of another student and dragged
us outside. I was hit on my knee with a lathi and punched on the temple.
Then all of us were gathered outside the Hall and pushed into police vans,
we were completely crushed in the van. We were taken to Ramna Police Station
and about forty-five of us were put into a miserable, stinking cell with
no light, no fan, no bathroom. Half the room was covered with urine. One
of my friends got drenched in urine when he lay down to sleep in the dark.
I was not badly injured, but two students in the cell were seriously wounded.
One was lying unconscious with a severe head wound.
AT was among the students released on February 6 from Dhaka Central
Jail.
MS
MS, twenty years old and a first-year student, told Human Rights Watch/Asia
that he was on his way to class when he heard the noise of the police raid
and decided to return to his room. From the verandah outside his room he
saw that police were gathered outside the East Gate of the campus and were
throwing tear gas over the gate. After a while the area around Jagannath
Hall became a "sea of blue," the color of the police uniform. He and four
other students took refuge in his room, but soon afterwards the room door
was forced open by the police. A policeman brandishing a gun entered the
room and began beating the students; MS was hit several times with a lathi
on his back and head. After the policeman herded the students out to the
verandah, they slipped off to the third-floor canteen for safety. Many
students were still eating in the canteen. Ten minutes later about thirty
policemen entered the canteen. According to MS:
The police scolded the students for taking food in the month of Ramadan.
They also ordered the students to chant "jai Bangla" (the
slogan of the Awami League) so as to indirectly admit that they supported
the Awami League. The students fled to the corner of the room and the police
started beating the stronger and better-built students with lathis. First
they tied each student's hands together and then roped about five or so
students together; they gathered the students outside the October Memorial
building and stuffed them into police vans. It felt as though there were
a hundred students in the compact and closed-up van. It was an unbearable
situation. I was virtually senseless; I could not take breath. We were
taken to Ramna Police Station. What happened there was also unbearable.
We were divided into two cells; the one I was in was cramped, dark, airless,
with an overpowering bad odor, and a dirt floor drenched in urine and excrement.
One of the students in the cell was unconscious, he looked dead. The next
day I ended up in Dhaka Central Jail, where conditions were a little better
but still terrible.
PC
PC, aged twenty-five, a physics student from Sirajganj, resides in the
East Building of Jagannath Hall. PC was in his room with five other students
during the afternoon on January 31, when he heard loud shouts and noise
and became aware of tear gas inside his residence hall. PC's room is near
the front gate of the East Building; he heard the gate break and almost
immediately policemen broke the door of his room and entered. They pushed
PC roughly and then beat him with lathis. He was hit with lathis along
the entire left side of his body as he lay on his bed. He was also hit
hard on his left temple with metal handcuffs; his head and parts of his
body became bloodied from the resultant wound. He pointed out a deep scar
on his temple to Human Rights Watch/Asia. The other students in the room
were also badly injured. After beating up the students, the police left
the room. They returned after half an hour to take him to the waiting police
vans. He was "barely conscious and could not walk." He was carried down
and laid on the ground in front of the Hall before being thrown into a
police van; at that point he lost consciousness. He regained consciousness
in a cell in Ramna Police Station. After about six hours he received medical
attention. PC could not walk without help for several days and he suffered
from throbbing headaches for at least a month. Through the intercession
of a political leader, PC spent several weeks in the jail hospital at Dhaka
Central Jail before his release on April 2, 1996. About his condition at
present he told Human Rights Watch/Asia, "My brain is not okay, I cannot
concentrate for any length of time."
BS and Others
BS, aged twenty-four, a final year master's student and general secretary
of the BCL for Jagannath Hall, resides in the October Memorial Building
of the Hall. On January 31 he was confined to bed with chicken pox. The
police entered his room and dragged him from the bed and beat him with
lathis on the back, sides and legs. He was shoved into a police van along
with the other students and taken to Ramna Police Station. He spent over
two weeks in the pox ward at Dhaka Central Jail, along with several other
students who had contracted the disease in detention, until he was released
on April 2, 1996.
BKD, a twenty-three-year-old Hindu student in his final year at Dhaka
University, told Human Rights Watch that on January 31 he was in his room
at about 1:00 p.m., in bed with a cold. Frightened by the noise of the
police raid, he remained in his room until 3:00 p.m. when the police began
kicking in his door and breaking the windows. One policeman fired through
the door and window, and the bullet that went through the door hit BKD
in the leg just above the ankle. The police then broke through the door
and entered the room. The other students in the room told the police to
take BKD to the hospital, and a police officer who arrived a few minutes
later allowed the students to take BKD to the Dhaka Medical College. He
had sustained a linear fracture; when Human Rights Watch/Asia interviewed
him three months after the incident, he stated that the injury had slowed
his walking and he continued to have some swelling.
RC, a twenty-three-year-old marketing student, told Human Rights Watch/Asia
that he was in the canteen having lunch when he saw police firing tear
gas on the campus. They entered the canteen, where about fifty students
were eating, and searched them. The police struck RC on the back and accused
him of being a member of the "Shanti Bhahini" -- a tribal guerrilla group
which has been fighting for the autonomy of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
After about five minutes, RC was taken with the others to the Ramna police
station, where he was kicked by a policeman. He was released on February
6.
AKB told Human Rights Watch/Asia that he was sleeping in his room when
the police began pounding on the door. When he opened the door, four policemen
entered. They took his watch and cursed him, calling him malauner bacha
(son of an infidel) among other things. One policeman picked him up by
his collar, beat him on his head and arms, and took him down to the police
van. At the police station he was given first aid, but he continued to
have pain for weeks after the incident. Human Rights Watch interviewed
six other students who described events on January 31 along the same lines
as the students whose testimony is given above.
Despite threats from BCL activists, Prime Minister Zia went to the campus
on February 1 under tight security to open the book fair. According to
newspaper reports, at least twenty-five students were injured in sporadic
clashes between police and students. A series of handmade bombs were detonated
and several rounds of bullets fired by opposition students during the prime
minister's visit. Police lobbed tear gas shells and used wooden batons
to disperse the student protestors. After the inauguration ceremony, the
protests spread to several areas of Dhaka city where crowds damaged and
set ablaze vehicles.
On February 4, rival student groups fought a campus gun battle precipitated
by an attack by pro-government students on opposition students conducting
a black-flag demonstration against police violence on the university campus.
Both sides used automatic guns in the clash, which was diffused by police
using tear gas and batons.
VI. FACTIONAL FIGHTING Uttara Incident: March 2, 1996
On March 2, 1996 S.M. Khaliq, the BNP leader for Uttara district on
the outskirts of Dhaka, was scheduled to address a rally in Uttara at 11
a.m.. Many of his supporters had come out into the streets to participate
in the rally. Uttara area also has a large contingent of Awami League supporters
and the two sides clashed with lathis and knives. Khaliq's approaching
motorcade had to turn back because it was blocked by the crowd. His escort
reportedly fired into the crowd injuring two people in the thigh and shin
respectively.
About 1:30 a.m. that night about fifty policemen arrived in the area;
according to eyewitnesses a group of local BNP activists (Babul Husain,
Abul Husain and Khoka) directed the police to the houses of Awami League
supporters, most of whom had already fled the area fearing a reprisal from
the BNP-controlled police. One witness, K (10),
who was not in the area during the day's disturbances, told Human Rights
Watch that the police knocked on his door shortly after 1:30 a.m and asked
for his sons, who had gone into hiding. Only his youngest son, A, aged
fourteen, was sleeping in the house. The police arrested A and put him
in a police lock-up. He was finally released on March 6 and sent to stay
with a relative. In view of the ongoing tension in the area between rival
political groups, K also stayed away from home until March 20 (he was unable
to be at his mother's bedside when she died on March 14). On March 21 K's
house and attached electronics shop as well as four other houses in the
neighborhood were ransacked and looted by BNP activists. K's wife, the
only family member at home at the time, locked herself in one room when
the attack occurred; the attackers tried to break the door of the room
down but failed. K told Human Rights Watch, "The BNP people were able to
do this because all the male supporters of the Awami League had left the
area on account of the frequent police raids targeting them. They broke
everything in my house: pots, pans, rice box, lights, furniture, fixtures,
everything. They broke into my electronics ship and stole VCRs, VCPs, satellite
receivers and other electrical devices. They broke the dish antenna set
up at my house. The damage to my shop alone was about Tk.133,500 [about
$ 3,300]." His wife and neighbors identified the looters as Hanif Ali,
Javed Ali, Sabid Ali, Abid Ali, Babul Husain, Abul Husain and Akther Husain.
The police, citing pressure from "higher ups," refused to register the
complaints of representatives of the five affected households. At the police's
suggestion, the complainants reported the incident to a magistrate who
forwarded the complaint to the local police station. The police then investigated
the incident, but no one has been apprehended or charged in connection
with it.
Tongi and Sherpur Incidents: February 26, 1996
Hundreds of anti-government demonstrators from the major opposition
parties attempted to disrupt rail services at the important railway junction
of Tongi in the suburbs of Dhaka on February 26, 1996. Demonstrators
blocked rail tracks with boulders, broke or damaged certain segments of
the tracks and tried to set a signal system on fire. Bomb- and stone-throwing
protestors clashed with police and BDR troops called in to guard the junction,
who responded with tear gas shells and rubber bullets. Eyewitnesses reported
that the police also fired at the crowd with rifles, killing one demonstrator,
Bangkusha, on the spot. A news photographer present at the time told Human
Rights Watch that the shooting shocked both the police and the demonstrators:
"Before the shooting, the demonstrators, including Bangkusha, were enjoying
the melée and even the police were joking around. Afterwards the
crowd dispersed quickly and the police also withdrew. I have pictures of
a laughing Bangkusha in the middle of the fray and then a picture of his
dead body."
Another two people were killed in the northern district of Sherpur when
hundreds of opposition activists attacked the home of the local BNP leader,
Habibur Rahman. Habibur Rahman's grandson Suman was brutally killed by
the attackers. The leader of the attack, Abdul Rashid, also died in the
incident.
Narayanganj Incidents
On June 5, 1995, Mohammad Afzal Husain, a local leader of the BCL, aged
twenty-three, was stabbed and axed to death in the town of Narayanganj
near the Bangladesh capital. Husain's father, Habibur Rahman, told Human
Rights Watch that his son was a victim of the ongoing political clash between
the BNP and the Awami League. He said that the suspects in his son's murder
were local BNP activists Aizza, Bizza, Ratan, Sharifuddin and Sumon. The
police conducted a limited investigation into the murder; Aizza was arrested
but released on bail. According to news reports one other BCL leader, Mohammad
Murad, also died in the attack and ten others were wounded.
At about 9:30 a.m. on March 8 some fifty or sixty Awami League supporters
were picketing on the main road outside the Narayanganj Awami League office
when twenty or twenty-five JCD militants armed with sawed-off rifles and
revolvers approached and began shooting in the direction of the picketers.
Two of the Awami League demonstrators were killed: Abul Kasim, a Sramik
[Volunteer] League member in his early twenties was shot in the chest and
died on the spot; George Mian, a Jubo League member aged about nineteen
was shot in the back and died just after admittance to the local hospital.
Most of the Awami League activists were able to escape through the back
door of the office. One of the Awami League workers present during the
incident told Human Rights Watch, "We did not have the chance to respond;
we were caught unprepared because we were at the Awami League office and
we cannot keep arms in our own office." A First Information Report (FIR)
(11) about the attack was registered at the Narayanganj Police
Station but to date no arrests have been made in connection with the case.
On February 27 a Jubo League member, Sayed Ahmed Mukhul, aged twenty-eight
years, was killed in a late afternoon attack on the home of Shaheedullah,
secretary general of the Awami League for Paikpara, near Narayanganj town.
Mukhul's father is an influential Awami League organizer for the neighboring
Fatullah area. Mukhul's father, Abdur Rasheed, told Human Rights Watch
that for some time prior to Mukhul's death, the family had been harassed
by mercenaries hired by a local BNP leader, Mohammad Ali. At 2:00 a.m.
on February 22, BNP mercenaries had attempted to burn the family home;
family members scared off the arsonists and controlled the fire but one
of Abdur Rasheed's daughters sustained burns on her leg from the incident.
On February 23, at 5:30 p.m., Mukhul's cousin, Habibur Rahman Ripon, was
attacked and shot in the leg by the same band of mercenaries. Ripon himself
supports the BNP, but the rest of his family play leadership roles in the
local network of the Awami League. The family identified Suman, Farid and
Aslam as the culprits in the attacks on Mukhul and Ripon. Suman was arrested
and taken into custody in connection with both attacks; Farid and Aslam
remain at large.
Shaheen Chawdhury, aged thirty, leader of the Siddirganj Jubo League,
was shot to death on March 15 reportedly by a rival BNP faction led by
Abol Kasim, in Siddirganj near Narayanganj town. Chawdhury's mother, Shaheena
Begum, head of the local Mohila [Women's] Awami League, told Human Rights
Watch that Shaheen was abducted from outside the family home at 6 a.m.
that morning. His family rushed to Abol Kasim's house at 7:00 a.m. after
they were alerted to the kidnapping by a neighbor. They found Shaheen and
his armed assailants Abol Kasim, Pandu Mian, Jalal, Rahman and another
Rahman, en route; Shaheen had been shot in the right eye and Abol Kasim
and Pandu Mian were stabbing him on his chest and stomach. Shaheen's family
members made immediate arrangements to take him to the Dhaka Medical College
Hospital, but he died on the way. Although the police investigated the
incident no one has been charged or arrested in the case.
Arson Attacks by Awami League Activists in Chittagong: February 28,
1996
On February 28, the day A.B.M. Mohiuddin Chowdhury, the powerful mayor
of Chittagong, was arrested, mobs of Awami League activists attacked several
major businesses in commercial districts of Chittagong. During the attacks,
the Chittagong police did nothing to prevent the attacks even though there
were clear indications that the mayor's supporters might respond to the
arrest with violence. In the days before his arrest, Chowdhury had made
inflammatory statements inciting his supporters to take extreme measures
to paralyze the city. It was clear that his actions were endorsed by senior
Awami League leaders. The police ignored appeals for assistance by employees
of the businesses under attack, as did the fire brigade, in part out of
fear of the armed mobs.
Attack on Biman Airlines
The offices of Biman Airlines, Bangladesh's national airline, suffered
extensive damage at the hands of the opposition protestors. An employee
of Biman told Human Rights Watch/Asia that the Awami League had called
a hartal (general strike) earlier that day. As an essential service,
the office had conducted a small amount of business during the hartal and
had opened after 2:00 p.m. At 6:40 p.m., just after Biman staff had locked
the front doors, the employee noticed that a huge mob was closing in on
the building through the surrounding streets. At the time, several employees
and a few customers remained in the building. People in the mob began throwing
molotov cocktails and other handmade bombs at the building. The employee
assisted the remaining staff and customers to flee out the back of the
building. No one was injured.
The employee called the fire brigade and the police department, and
was told, "We are taking measures--whatever is required." In fact, police
who were normally stationed in the area had been withdrawn at about 3:00
p.m., shortly after the mayor was arrested. The employee also spoke with
authorities in Dhaka, who similarly stated that they were taking action,
although nothing at all was done to prevent the mob from destroying the
building. The crowd, protected by gunmen, looted virtually everything movable
from the building. When Human Rights Watch/Asia visited the site in April,
the building's ground floor was stripped bare and littered with chunks
of concrete and broken glass. According to the employee several computer
monitors, thirty-four telephones, a modem, a ticket machine and a photocopier
as well as other equipment and furniture had been looted. The walls and
ceiling were scorched, all the windows were broken, and the hulks of burned
cars surrounded the building.
The attack appeared to have been organized in advance as members of
the crowd carried molotov cocktails and clearly arrived at the office with
the intention of burning it. The building appeared to have been targeted
because Biman is a government-run enterprise. Some in the crowd also shouted
slogans accusing Biman of staying open during the strike.
Attack on the James Finlay Company
Employees at James Finlay PLC, a British-owned tea-processing, shipping
and insurance company, told Human Rights Watch/Asia that at about 4:45
p.m. a large crowd assembled around the building and a small group of young
men began throwing bricks through the windows. About sixty members of the
staff were in the building at the time. They assembled on the first floor
[one above ground level]. The group set twelve company cars on fire and
then set ablaze the ground floor, where the offices of City Bank were located.
When the Finlay employees attempted to leave, the group of young men ordered
them back inside the building. The building was equipped with fire escapes
from the upper floors but the employees were unable to get them open, so
they returned to the first floor. Seeing that the young men had left, they
exited the building. The employees contacted the police, but received no
response. The fire brigade did not arrive until seven hours later, long
after the damage had been done. That damage was extensive: the ground floor
was gutted and the first floor partially burned; equipment, including fax
machines and computers, was looted from the bank offices on the ground
floor. There were no serious injuries.
Several buildings in the Agrabad commercial area of Chittagong suffered
similar damage, notably NIB House, where former BNP MP Amir Khasru Mahmood
has an office. In other parts of the city several banks and shops were
attacked, looted and gutted. Chittagong's newly-constructed railway station
also came under attack.
VII. ATTACKS ON THE PRESS In several incidents during the weeks before and after the February
15 election, journalists were assaulted, harassed or arrested either because
of their suspected ties to the opposition, or because they were reporting
on or photographing police firings and other abuses. We describe a few
such incidents below. (12) To our knowledge
there has been no official investigation into these cases, nor has any
member of the police been punished for attacks on the press.
Rajshahi Incident
On February 10, 1996, a planned election meeting at Madrasah Math in
Rajshahi district to be led by then Prime Minister Khaleda Zia prompted
the combined opposition to call for a general strike that day and resist
Zia's visit to the area. According to eyewitnesses, police and picketing
opposition activists were present at the meeting site from early that morning,
several hours before the scheduled meeting time. The latter were menacing
supporters of the prime minister by throwing "cocktails" --crude, hand-made
grenades made of gunpowder, ground glass and shrapnel -- and pelting stones.
After noon, tensions between the opposition activists and the police escalated,
and the police increasingly came under attack by the crowd. The police
lobbed tear gas shells as a few people in the crowd opened fire toward
the police with sawed-off rifles. The police also fired sporadically in
the general direction of the activists. One of the opposition activists
hurled a handmade bomb at the police; shrapnel from the bomb blew off part
of a policeman's head. The policeman was rushed to hospital but succumbed
to his injuries. Eyewitnesses attributed this attack to members of Islami
Chhatra Shibbir, the student wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami. A small number
of policemen were injured in separate attacks. Eyewitnesses described the
atmosphere as extremely tense. One said, "The police were terrified. They
did not know where the next attack would come from."
The opposition activists retreated when about seventy or eighty BDR
paramilitary troops led by Major Abdul Bari arrived at the site. On the
assumption that the opposition activists had taken refuge nearby, the BDR
personnel stormed houses and buildings in the neighborhood, indiscriminately
beating residents, including children. One eyewitness told Human Rights
Watch/Asia:
From one house a ten-year-old boy was dragged out by a BDR soldier and
beaten mercilessly with the butt of a rifle. The boy's mother came to rescue
him, but Major Bari's bodyguard put the barrel of his sub-machine gun on
her arm and, using foul language, warned her that if she did not stay away
he would shoot.
The boy was forced inside a BDR vehicle. Three photojournalists -- YKJ,
TR and SI -- attempting to take photographs of his weeping mother and sister
were severely beaten by BDR personnel.
YKJ, Photojournalist, Janakantha
As YKJ, a photojournalist for the Dhaka-based daily newspaper Janakantha,
attempted to take a picture of the detained boy's mother and sister, Major
Bari threatened him. YKJ refrained from taking the picture and requested
that he be allowed to leave. YKJ told Human Rights Watch/Asia:
Major Bari punched me directly on the mouth, causing my gums and lips
to bleed. I again requested that I be let go. Major Bari then punched me
several times on the mouth splitting my gums and breaking four of my front
teeth. Other BDR personnel came up; they grabbed and smashed one of my
cameras.
When YKJ resisted their attempts to take his other camera, the BDR troops
began kicking him on his back and legs and beating his upper body with
the butts of their rifles while threatening to shoot him. Later he discovered
that both his wrist and elbow had been fractured in the encounter. Major
Bari himself then took YKJ's remaining camera. The police arrived on the
scene at this point. An assistant police commissioner helped Joy to his
feet and prepared the way for him to leave the area. As he fled YKJ was
again surrounded by BDR personnel who kicked and beat him severely with
their rifle butts; they smashed his glasses and took his watch, zoom lens
and other photographic equipment, camera jackets, wallet and organizer.
When YKJ was finally able to escape, he saw a separate group of BDR personnel
brutally beating another photojournalist, SI of the daily Banglarbani;
he saw them smash one of SI's cameras and confiscate the other. After emergency
medical treatment in Rajshahi, YKJ spent twenty-six days in a Dhaka hospital
recovering from his injuries. Despite dental treatment, he can no longer
eat anything hard or brittle.
TR, Photojournalist, Independent
TR managed to take photographs of the detained boy's mother and sister.
When he saw Major Bari of the BDR assault YKJ, he quickly offered his own
camera to the major out of fear. Junior BDR personnel took the camera from
him and smashed it in the street. Then, on Major Bari's orders, five or
six of them started punching and beating TR with the butts of their rifles.
When the BDR personnel turned to beat the third photojournalist, SI, TR
attempted to escape. He was chased by two BDR soldiers who beat him further,
cursed him, and threatened to shoot him. He was eventually let go after
the intervention of a BDR officer who was a passing acquaintance. TR told
Human Rights Watch/Asia that his fellow photojournalist SI was very badly
beaten; his injuries, however, were not as serious as YKJ's.
Feni Incident
Following an election meeting attended by Prime Minister Khaleda Zia
on February 7, 1996 at Mahipal in Feni district, at approximately 11:30
a.m., a procession of about fifty activists of the Bangladesh Chhatra League
entered the meeting enclosure carrying black flags and armed with bricks
and cocktails. When the opposition activists attempted to disrupt the meeting
by chanting slogans, a fight broke out between them and Jatyabadi Chhatra
Dal members in the audience, who were also armed with hockey sticks and
cocktails. One of the Chhatra League processionists was injured in the
clash and had to be carried away by BDR personnel. After several minutes
the Chhatra Leaguers detonated five cocktail bombs and left the arena.
Eyewitnesses reported that the prime minister restrained the police and
her supporters from retaliating at the time.
Eight newsmen were injured in the incident: HRH of Ajker Kagoj,
SI and HA of Banglar Bani, MA of Ittefaq, MAM of Janakantha,
MHN of Sangbad, DA of The Daily Life, MK of Karnaphuli.
MAM, Photojournalist, Janakantha
A photojournalist with the pro-Awami League daily Ajker Kagoj, HRH,
took pictures of members of the Jatiyabadi Chhatra Dal clearing away black
flags left behind by the Chhatra League activists. The Chhatra Dal members
accused HRH of photographing them while deliberately refraining from catching
on film the disruption caused by the Chhatra Leaguers. When MAM intervened
to rescue HRH from the Chhatra Dal activists who were beating him, the
latter turned on MAM, punching him in the nose and attacking him with lathis.
Eventually both MAM and HRH were saved by BDR personnel who made a protective
human wall around them until the Chhatra Dal activists dispersed.
HRH, Photojournalist, Ajker Kagoj
In addition to being beaten by Jatybadi Chhatra Dal members at the Feni
meeting site, the following day HRH was more severely beaten at the hands
of the police. HRH was taking photographs of a clash between violent Awami
League supporters and the police who were seeking to contain them when
Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Ghaffoor of Feni police station
threatened to shoot him for taking pictures and grabbed HRH's camera. Other
policemen beat HRH with their lathis on his head and all over his body.
After sustaining a deep wound on his head, HRH was taken to Feni City (Saddar)
Police Station and locked up for the night. Although he was in great pain
and bleeding from the head wound, he received no medical attention for
several hours. Eventually he was taken to hospital where he received three
stitches on the head; he was then brought back to the police station lock-up
and was not released until the next evening after the intercession of his
colleagues. Upon his return to Dhaka, HRH was hospitalized for seven days
for a number of infected wounds. He still suffers from pain in his head.
The police never returned his camera and obstructed his efforts to register
a complaint about it with at the Feni police station.
MHN, Photojournalist, Sangbad
MHN was attacked by supporters of Khaleda Zia when he took pictures
of the clash between them and the Chhatra League demonstrators. They tried
to get his camera, but he resisted. He was beaten with hockey sticks and
kicked on the back; when he was threatened with a big sickle-shaped knife
(ramdao) he was protected by the BDR patrol guarding the meeting
site. MHN saw pro-Zia activists attack HRH, MAM and one other journalist.
Ajker Kagoj Newspaper
Ajker Kajoj is a pro-Awami League Dhaka-based daily newspaper.
The newspaper's editor told Human Rights Watch that Ajker Kagoj
had suffered various forms of harassment from the BNP government since
1992, such as the withholding of government advertising, reductions in
its newsprint quotas, and the filing of numerous libel suits against it.
On February 29, about 1:30 a.m. about one hundred policemen surrounded
the family home of Kazi Shahid Ahmed, editor of the
Ajker Kagoj,
as well as the adjacent block. Using a locksmith to open up the locked
gates of the house, the police roughed up the private security guard and
entered the home. They told the editor's son, Kazi Nabil Ahmed, that they
had a warrant for his father's arrest. They searched the house and interrogated
Nabil Ahmed about the whereabouts of his father and details about various
family members. Plainclothes policemen watched the house for several days
following the incident. Kazi Shahid Ahmed remained in hiding from February
29 until March 31 when the BNP government handed over power to the caretaker
authority.
Ajker Kagoj staff told Human Rights Watch/Asia that the newspaper's
office was attacked by unidentified assailants on April 14, 1995. Some
seven masked men entered the office premises, pointed guns at the security
guards, smashed up a car parked in the compound, shot at the building,
broke windows and damaged a bust of Sheikh Mujib located at the building
entrance.
SBK, Chief Reporter, Ajker Kagoj
On February 29, 1996, at 1:00 a.m., police, with guns drawn, surrounded
the newspaper's office in the Dhanmondi area of Dhaka. The police entered
the newsroom, showed an arrest warrant and arrested SBK, the paper's chief
reporter. The police also told SBK that they had an arrest warrant for
his editor, Kazi Shahid Ahmed.
SBK spent the night in a bare and dirty cell at a police station and
was taken to the Special Magistrate Court the next day at 2:30 p.m.. The
magistrate has no authority to grant bail, and SBK could not go before
a judge since the courts were closed for the weekly Friday holiday. At
7:30 p.m. SBK was shifted to Dhaka Central Jail, to a fetid, windowless
and mosquito-infested cell with no light source, a bare dirt floor to sleep
on, and a hole in the ground for a toilet. During the night, apparently
as the result of some form of deliberate pressure, the toilet hole spewed
excrement and sewage all over SBK's cell. He spent the night crouched in
a cramped space in the cell that was relatively unaffected, but the stench
was overpowering. The following day he was moved to a dingy and foul neighboring
cell where he was interrogated by intelligence officials who wanted to
know where to find his editor. He remained in the cell for a week after
he was refused bail by the sessions court. (13)
On March 11 he was finally moved to a cell of the division allotted to
political prisoners -- a comfortable cell with a bed, mosquito-netting
and an attached bathroom. When the non-cooperation movement ended on March
31, he got a court order for his release; he was released on bail the following
day.
MA, Photographer, Ajker Kagoj
On March 19, at approximately 5:00 p.m., MA was covering a march on
parliament organized by the major opposition parties when a confrontation
developed between the processionists and the police; the police were trying
to obstruct the procession and started beating the public with lathis.
The police stopped MA from taking photographs and attacked him with lathis;
he was hit on his head and upper body. Some colleagues took him to hospital
where he stayed overnight and received stitches for a cut on the head.
He recovered fully.
Chittagong Incidents
PR, Photojournalist, Janakantha and Associated Press
After the mayor of Chittagong, an Awami League leader, was arrested
on February 28, 1996, his supporters went on a rampage ransacking, gutting
and looting a number of shops and offices all over the city. PR, a photojournalist
with the Dhaka-based daily,
Janakantha and the Associated Press,
was at the New Market area of the city at about 10:00 a.m. as an Awami
League rally filled the streets to protest the mayor's arrest. Police contingents
were also present trying to control and disperse the violent and angry
mob. PR saw police and BDR personnel shoot into the crowd from three or
four police and BDR jeeps that drove by New Market on two occasions; two
people were shot and killed. PR took photographs of the bloodied bodies.
Police and BDR personnel stationed adjacent to the nearby Chittagong railway
station also exchanged fire with armed youths in the crowd. There were
no more than ten or fifteen casualties from the cross-fire because the
two groups were at considerable distance from each other. PR told Human
Rights Watch/Asia:
Initially I lay prostrate in the street to avoid the flying bullets
but as soon as I got a chance I ran towards the police holding up my cameras
to show that I was a news photographer. A policeman placed the barrel of
his gun on my chest while his fellow policemen encouraged him to shoot,
since I had taken photographs of the police firing at the crowd. A policeman
took one of my cameras and smashed it on the ground -- an officer intervened
to save my other one. Policemen kicked me on my legs several times before
detaining me in the railway station veranda. They emphatically warned me
not to touch my remaining camera. The Awami League supporters attacked
the railway station by firing and hurling cocktails from the direction
of New Market. However, there was no real damage because of the distance
between the mob and the railway station. After two hours or so the crowd
dispersed, and I was released.
Inqilab Office
H described what happened at the offices of the newspaper Inqilab
following the arrest on February 28 of the mayor of Chittagong, an Awami
League leader. (14) Inqilab, a daily
newspaper that supports the Jamaat-e-Islami party, has a circulation of
250,000, one of the largest in the country. On March 2, at about 8:00 p.m.
, about twenty to thirty BNP activists carrying containers of kerosene
and guns arrived at the office and asked for H. When told that he was not
in, they shouted at his colleagues to tell them where he was and threatened
to kill him. The mob complained that Inqilab had made too much of
the mayor's arrest. Hearing the noise, H hid in the office washroom. After
about half an hour, the men left but told H's colleagues that they would
return.
About three weeks later, one evening at about 9:00 p.m., ten to fifteen
men carrying guns assembled across the street from the office and fired
at the building. A few days later, a second mob came to the office. H was
not in the office at the time. Members of a BNP procession which passed
the office threw stones at the building, breaking the glass in many of
the windows along that side of the building. Four or five members of the
procession tried to force open the office gate and shouted that H should
be killed. On March 27 or 28, stones were again thrown at the office.
After the first incident, H. telephoned the metropolitan police, who
told him that they were "helpless" to do anything.
RC, Photojournalist, Purbakone
On February 15, RC, a senior photographer with the Chittagong-based
daily Purbakone, was assaulted by police after he took a photograph
of BNP activists stamping voting papers and stuffing them into ballot boxes
at the Collegiate School polling station in Chittagong in the presence
of the police. He told Human Rights Watch/Asia:
A police officer stopped me and asked, "What are you doing?" Then he
pulled me into the road and I was surrounded by police and BDR who beat
me with their rifle butts on my chest and shoulders. They pulled the film
out of my camera and threw it to the ground. They cursed me and told me
never to take photographs again.
RC identified an assistant commissioner, Motiur Rahman, and a sergeant
of the Double Muring police station, among the police beating him. After
a short time, other journalists intervened and stopped the assault.
SHR, Photojournalist, Purbakone
SHR, Purbakone's chief correspondent and photographer in Rangamati,
told Human Rights Watch/Asia that on February 15 he was covering the Kathaltoli
polling station in the center of Rangamati when activists of the BNP Jubo
Dal armed with lathis and kirich [long knives] gathered outside
the station as an Awami League procession approached the site. The Awami
League activists threw a molotov cocktail at the BNP group, which landed
some distance in front of the station. No one was injured. As the BNP activists
rushed toward the Awami League group to retaliate and the opposition group
fled, SHR took a photograph. He was quickly surrounded by members of the
BNP group, who beat him on his legs, back and arms, and stole his wallet
and camera. After about ten minutes, a senior leader of the Jubo Dal recognized
and rescued him. SHR was treated at a local hospital and released, but
it took him one month to fully recover. After he filed a charges against
the Jubo Dal members, he was threatened by the Jubo Dal and Chhatra Dal
leaders that he had named to drop the case. The police did not begin their
investigation into the charges until April, and at the time Human Rights
Watch/Asia interviewed SHR, no arrests had been made.
VIII. CONCLUSION The two-year political impasse between the opposition alliance led by
the Awami League and the BNP government plunged Bangladesh into a genuine
law and order crisis and economic breakdown during the first three months
of 1996. Although the government responded to the concrete threats to internal
security by deploying the police and paramilitary and, in some instances
the army, it failed to control or punish its own supporters who contributed
to the prevailing lawlessness by engaging in violent clashes with their
political opponents, attacking rival parties' offices and assaulting and
intimidating journalists. Similarly the government did not make a serious
effort to ensure that state law enforcement bodies used proportionate force,
or targeted only actual offenders of the law, or dealt impartially with
all offenders regardless of their political affiliation. Consequently state
security personnel routinely used excessive and indiscriminate force in
raids and in clashes with the opposition's armed militants and unarmed
demonstrators, exacerbating the violence and volatility reigning in the
country's major cities. Law enforcement personnel, who in many instances
did not dispel the threat posed to citizens by opposition militants, further
violated their mandate by beating up and harassing journalists and news
photographers who covered the near-daily confrontations. In addition, although
the police attempted to counter opposition militants, they routinely failed
to control BNP activists openly clashing with their political rivals. Abusive
members of the security forces were not, in general, prosecuted or punished
for illegal actions or dereliction of duty.
The opposition, for its part, effectively authorized its militant cadres
to resort to violence and intimidation in enforcing numerous calls for
general strikes that paralyzed the country's commercial centers for days
at a time. Furthermore, in bringing its anti-government campaign into the
streets, the opposition set the stage for acts of murder and assault, sieges
of government buildings, disruptions of all modes of transport, destruction
of vehicles and attacks and looting of offices and shops in several cities
and towns. Throughout the agitation, leaders of opposition parties demonstrated
an utter disregard for public safety. No efforts were made to ensure that
organized mobs and party cadres confined their protests and demonstrations
to the limits of the law, nor to discipline supporters guilty of criminal
acts.
All political parties should take concrete steps to ensure that renewed
violence does not jeopardize Bangladesh's return to democratic governance
following the June 12 election. The international community should also
press the main contenders for power to disarm their militant cadres and
be prepared, if elected to office, to fully investigate all reports of
violence and abuse and punish those responsible as required by law.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This report was written by Samya Burney, a W. Bradford Wiley Fellow
for Human Rights Watch/Asia. The report was edited by Patricia Gossman,
Senior Researcher and Sidney Jones, Executive Director of Human Rights
Watch/Asia. It was reviewed by Cynthia Brown, Program Director of Human
Rights Watch. Paul Lall, Human Rights Watch/Asia associate, assisted in
the production of the report.
Human Rights Watch is very grateful to those in Dhaka and Chittagong
who assisted us in interviewing individuals and families and gathering
documentation for this report, particularly members of the human rights
community and the press.
Human Rights Watch/Asia
Human Rights Watch is a nongovernmental organization established in
1978 to monitor and promote the observance of internationally recognized
human rights in Africa, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East and among the
signatories of the Helsinki accords. It is supported by contributions from
private individuals and foundations worldwide. It accepts no government
funds, directly or indirectly. The staff includes Kenneth Roth, executive
director; Cynthia Brown, program director; Holly J. Burkhalter, advocacy
director; Barbara Guglielmo, finance and administration director; Robert
Kimzey, publications director; Jeri Laber, special advisor; Lotte Leicht,
Brussels office director; Juan Méndez, general counsel; Susan Osnos,
communications director; Jemera Rone, counsel; and Joanna Weschler, United
Nations representative. Robert L. Bernstein is the chair of the board and
Adrian W. DeWind is vice chair. Its Asia division was established in 1985
to monitor and promote the observance of internationally recognized human
rights in Asia. Sidney Jones is the executive director; Mike Jendrzejczyk
is the Washington director; Robin Munro is the Hong Kong director; Patricia
Gossman is a senior researcher; Jeannine Guthrie is NGO Liaison; Dinah
PoKempner is Counsel; Zunetta Liddell is a research associate; Joyce Wan
is a Henry R. Luce Fellow; Diana Tai-Feng Cheng and Paul Lall are associates;
Mickey Spiegel is a research consultant. Andrew J. Nathan is chair of the
advisory committee and Orville Schell is vice chair.
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1. The Special Powers Act provides for detention
on broadly-defined grounds that include such activities as committing or
"being likely to commit" a "prejudicial act" likely or intended to "endanger
public safety or the maintenance of public order." The SPA has been used
by successive governments against persons engaged in peaceful protest and
against members of the press.
3. 0 In a September 1991 referendum, voters approved a constitutional amendment that ended sixteen years of presidential rule and re-established a parliamentary system of government.
4. 0 Zia reportedly agreed to step down thirty days before the next election to allow for the installation of a neutral interim government, but she could not get the combined opposition's assurance on a pivotal point: that they would not orchestrate street protests and political strife ahead of the polls.
5. 0 The amendment provides for an eleven-member caretaker administration --appointed by the president and headed by a chief adviser who must be a retired Supreme Court chief justice -- that would be responsible for holding elections within ninety days of the dissolution of parliament. The caretaker administration would exercise only routine executive functions until the election takes place and a new prime minister is appointed. The advisers would not be eligible to contest elections, and must not belong to or represent a political party or affiliated body. The amendment also provides for all future elections to be overseen by caretaker governments following the dissolution of parliament.
6. Bangladesh has many tribal groups who differ ethnically and linguistically from the majority of the population.
7. The Daily Star, February 1, 1996, pg.1 (Dhaka)
8. 0 Jagannath Hall is the only dormitory for students belonging to religious minorities on the Dhaka University Campus. It is a large dormitory, comprising four buildings: North, South, East and October Memorial Buildings. Three of the four buildings have dining halls or canteens for the students.
9. 0 The use by police of section 54 to indiscriminately detain the Jagannath Hall students has been questioned by commentators. Section 54 specifies nine grounds on the basis of which police can arrest a person without a warrant and in the absence of an order from a magistrate. These grounds include the existence of reasonable suspicion that a person has committed a cognizable offence. However, the police detained students indiscriminately, making no effort to assess whether there was reasonable suspicion of criminal involvement against them. The remaining eight grounds specified in section 54 also appear inapplicable to the circumstances of the arrests.
10. Names have been withheld for security reasons.
11. A FIR is the first police record of a crime and the starting point of any investigation.
12. For security reasons only journalists' initials are used.
13. 0 He was unable to appeal to the High Court: the non-cooperation movement began on March 9, 1996 and effectively closed the court for the next three weeks.