AFP
Bangladesh’s military has sacked three senior officers from a controversial elite unit over claims they abducted and killed seven people outside Dhaka, an official said yesterday.
The armed forces official said the officers have been dismissed and handed early retirement from the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), which rights groups blame for hundreds of extrajudicial killings.
“They were sent into premature retirement,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. He added one of those sacked was a commander of the RAB while the other two were his deputies.
The move comes after a businessman in the industrial city of Narayanganj last week accused the three of abducting his son in-law, a city councillor, and six of his associates.
Their bodies were found days after their disappearance floating in a nearby river. Post-mortem examinations showed they had been knocked unconscious with blows to the head and strangled with ropes.
RAB chief Moklesur Rahman said “the three officers have been withdrawn” from the force and a probe has been ordered.
According to the Daily Star, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has ordered her cabinet to find those responsible for the killings which have made national headlines.
The businessman told reporters that rivals of his son in-law hired the RAB officers at a cost of 60mn taka ($77,000) and alleged that the money was deposited in the officers’ bank accounts.
The killings marked a dramatic escalation in the cases of enforced disappearances in the country following the January 5 general election which the ruling Awami League party won after an opposition boycott.
The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) said most of the 300 people who have gone missing in the months leading up to and since the polls have been political opponents of the Awami League.
They have been mostly picked up from their homes by security agencies and some have later turned up dead, according to the BNP, adding that two more of its officials have gone missing since Sunday.
“Everyday we are appalled at the news of so many abductions and enforced disappearances. The situation has taken a dangerous turn,” BNP spokesman Fakhrul Islam Alamgir told reporters yesterday.
Government officials have denied that its security agencies were behind the disappearances of political opponents.
Lawmakers at a parliamentary body meeting said if involvement of officers of the RAB in the abduction and murder of seven people in Narayanganj is proved they would be given exemplary punishment as the “highest political leadership took it very seriously”.
The 10-member parliamentary standing committee on the home ministry has expressed “serious concern” over frequent incidents of disappearances and abductions and said such “ominous” incidents had put the government in
embarrassment.
State Minister for Home Asaduzzaman Khan assured the watchdog that the ministry would not spare anyone no matter how powerful they are.
“We have made it clear that the killings in Narayanganj and the alleged involvement of the RAB members are a matter of serious concern for the government. It has put both government and the MPs in embarrassment,” said Tipu Munshi, the standing committee
chairman.
Munshi said he met prime minister on Monday and sought her guidelines.
“The highest political office had taken the issue very seriously. So those involved in the murders in Narayanganj must be given exemplary
punishment,” said Tipu.
“The punishment should not be the same as with the case of an ordinary citizen because members of law enforcement agencies were tasked with protecting people, not doing any harm to them,” he said.
The Director General of the RAB Mokhlesur Rahman told the meeting that they would take actions against the members of the elite force, if found guilty.