Bangladesh

Among the Muslim-majority countries, Bangladesh has the third largest Muslim population.

It is one of the poorest, but most potential, Muslim countries.

• Islamic people in Bangladesh have been discriminated against and tortured for a long time. Their human rights have been violated again and again. Since the anti-Islamic, secular Awami League party came to power in early 2009, the situation has deteriorated drastically and dramatically. The main target is the Jamaat-e-Islami party and its student organization Chhatra Shibir. In many cases, Jamaat-Shibir people are discriminated against at educational institutions and are denied equal access to employment opportunities.

Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami

It is the third largest political party in Bangladesh.

Jamaat-e-Islami was originally established in British India by the great thinker Sayyid Abul Ala Mawdudi (1903 – 1979) in 1941.

Now all South Asian countries have their own chapter of Jamaat-e-Islami.

There was a movement in the then East Pakistan in 1971 to separate it from Pakistan. Jamaat was opposed to separating Pakistan, as it thought that a divided Pakistan would be weak and acutely vulnerable to Indian hegemonic designs. However, Pakistani forces tried to crush the independence movement which caused a civil war. The Pakistani forces committed large-scale atrocities around the country, while some of the freedom fighters also killed many Pakistanis residing in Bangladesh.

• Thus, through a violent history, Bangladesh was born in 1971. The first Prime Minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Mujibur Rahman through an investigation identified 195 war criminals in 1973 and all of them were Pakistani military officers. He introduced the International Crimes (tribunal) Act 1973. The very name of the tribunal suggests that the war criminals were not Bangladeshi. Otherwise, the word ‘international’ would not be used.

• However, after diplomatic exchanges between Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, the Bangladesh government decided to follow a “Forgive and Forget” policy. So in April 1974, all Pakistani army officers were freed. Later on, the Mujib government accused 752 Bangladeshis of ‘collaborating’ with the Pakistani army. On 31 December 1975, however, the Bangladesh government invalidated the collaborators law and thus settled the issue once and for all.

Since Jamaat-e-Islami was opposed to the division of Pakistan, in Bangladesh politics the 1971 issue has always been used against it for politically-motivated reasons. However, in the past no one thought of accusing the Jamaat leaders of war crimes. The secularist Awami League party was in power in 1996-2001. At that time, the Awami League regime did not raise the issue of 1971 war crimes. However, when the party came to power in early 2009, it planned to use the settled issue of the 1971 atrocities and thus to victimize Jamaat leaders.

Since Bangladesh was born, Jamaat people have wholeheartedly accepted it and shown complete loyalty to the country. However, 39 years after the independence of Bangladesh, in 2010 the current anti-Islamic, secularist government revived the defunct 1973 International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) only to discredit and penalize Jamaat leaders. It started imprisoning topmost Jamaat leaders one after another. It fabricated stories and enticed and forced people to witness against them. Conversely, it threatened and kidnapped defence lawyers and witnesses.

Bangladeshi prisons are now filled beyond capacity with Jamaat-Shibir men and women. Most topmost Jamaat leaders are languishing in prisons for years with false charges of crimes against humanity. According to the Turkish scholar and leader Yılmaz Balcın:

“If the political power insists on this wrongful attitude and proceeds with its intention to execute the leaders of the Jamaat-i-Islami Party, the murders committed will be comparable to those committed in the Karbala incident.”

Attacks on Islam in Bangladesh• The words 'absolute trust and faith in the

almighty Allah' has been deleted from Constitution by the current regime.

• Imprisonment of Islamic scholars• Attacks on Islamic personalities and institutions• Attacks on women wearing hijab• Continuous police raids on offices of Jamaat-

Shibir and other Islamic groups

• Beating up and murdering Islamic people on the street

• Tortures and deaths under police custody• Abductions, wrongful arrests and unidentified

murders• Torturing Islamic students at universities• Using the so-called International Crimes

Tribunal (ICT) to suppress Islamic organizations

• Total disregard of law and complete human rights violations.

Former and current Ameers of Jamaat are in prison for a long time. Prof.

Ghulam Azam is now 91 years old. The ruling party is fabricating accusations

to hang them!

Professor Ghulam Azam (1922—)Former Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer

Maulana Matiur Rahman Nizami (1943—)Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer

Maulana Delwar Hussain Sayedee (1942—)Jamaat-e-Islami Nayeb-e-Ameer

The greatest Bangladeshi Islamic preacher of all time is in jail for more than two years. While in

jail, he has lost his mother and son. Sufferings of family members are indescribable. The

government forces abducted his defence witness.

Maulana Abdus Subhan Jamaat-e-Islami Nayeb-e-Ameer

Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid Jamaat-e-Islami Secretary General

Md. Kamaruzzaman Jamaat-e-Islami Assistant Secretary General

Abdul Kader Mollah Jamaat-e-Islami Assistant Secretary General

A T M Azharul Islam Jamaat-e-Islami Acting Secretary General

Mistreatment of Jamaat Acting Secretary General

Mistreatment of senior Jamaat leaders!

Mir Quasem AliJamaat-e-Islami central leader

30 January 2012: Police and Awami hooligans killed a Jamaat man

9 Dec 2012:Awami League men thus killed this man on the street of Dhaka, as they suspected

him a Jamaat-Shibir man.

This is how the forces of the secularist Awami League party (now in power) beat up to death about a dozen Jamaat-Shibir people in Dhaka. Video clip available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZNKDBRVmgM

28 October 2006

The list of Jamaat-Shibir victims (martyrs) is becoming bigger….

Unprovoked attacks on Shibir students

• Many of them even cannot attend classes!• Police arrested many of them from hospitals.

They burn books including

the Qur’an!

Islamic female students and their mentor are raided and imprisoned!

One of them is five-month pregnant.

Ruling Awami League party forces in action!

Ruling Awami League party forces in action!

Islamic students are the victims!

Ruling Awami League party forces in action!

Ruling Awami League party men attack students’ dormitories!

Police and ruling Awami League party forces are in action!

Police forces are in action!

Mistreatment of Jamaat people

Cruel!

• 57 brilliant army officers were killed soon after Awami Leaguegovernment came to power in 2009. What a great lossfor a poor country like Bangladesh!

13 March 2009: Murder of one brilliant Islamic student leader Sharifuzzaman Nomani at Rajshahi

University by Awami League hooligans…

Death of opposition lawyer MU Ahmed

11 August 2011:

The police raided opposition lawyer MU Ahmed’s residence in early morning and unlawfully arrested him. He died soon after that. Who can console his family members?

Awami League government brutality!

Abductions by Awami League government forces: nobody knows where they are! Most probably, murdered!

22 September 2011: The trampling of democracy in Bangladesh under the secularist Awami League regime. This is how the police mistreated an opposition political

activist in the street of Dhaka.

2 May 2011: A police personnel is squeezing the head of an activist of Bangladesh Islami Andolon, as he tried to exercise his democratic right to demonstrate. Where are the international promoters of democracy now? Since Sheikh Hasina does everything to please her foreign patrons at the expense of the interest of Bangladesh, nowadays such repression and atrocities go unnoticed.

5 April 2011: Call them Islamic militants and then beat them up! Don't they have the right to demonstrate? Islamic groups are

the worst victims of Sheikh Hasina's fascism.

5 April 2011:

The government of Awami League again desecrated Baitul Mukarram, the national masjid of Bangladesh. Does Sheikh Hasina need to do this to please her foreign patrons?

Tip of the iceberg

We are afraid that these few reported cases of the widespread human rights violations in Bangladesh under the current Awami League government are only the tip of the iceberg. Since the government enjoys support from many local and international media outlets, the full extent of its criminality remains largely unnoticed.

In short, opposition people in Bangladesh, especially those involved in Islamic groups, are now stateless in their own country. Their houses are being raided and offices burnt on a regular basis. Most of them cannot stay in their own houses for the fear of police arrests or abductions.

For the sake of justice,

You may wish to do the following: 1.Spread this material to your friends.2.Write to your government and human rights

organizations.3.Write to local Bangladesh embassies. 4.Write to Awami League Prime Minister Sheikh

Hasina.

A draft letterMrs. Sheikh HasinaHonourable Prime MinisterGovernment of the People’s Republic of BangladeshPrime Minister's Office, Old Sangsad Bhaban, TejgaonDhaka-1215, Bangladesh

Subject: Stop human rights violations and release Jamaat-Shibir and other opposition leaders.

Dear Prime Minister,

I, ………………………………………………………………, am a Malaysian citizen from the state of…………………………..................... I am extremely concerned about your government’s attacks on Islam and Islamic personalities, human rights violations and repression on opposition people including women in our friendly country Bangladesh. I urge you to take effective measures immediately to:

a. Release all Jamaat-Shibir leaders and activists who have been unjustly detained by your government forces.

b. Stop harassing, arbitrarily arresting and unjustly detaining opposition leaders and activists.

c. Abolish the so-called International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) whose very existence is politically motivated, and very name is oxymoronic.

d. Restore constitutionally-guaranteed civil rights of all Bangladeshis. e. Stop human rights violations in Bangladesh.

-------------------------------------------------Signature and date

This material was produced on 30 December 2012. Fur updates on continuous human rights violations in Bangladesh, you may wish to visit:

http://www.jamaat-e-islami.org/en/http://english.shibir.org.bd/http://www.bdinn.com/