IGP Benazir questions number of ‘disappeared’

Inspector General of Police Benazir Ahmed has said the US alleged that 600 people were forcibly disappeared in Bangladesh since 2009, but no list of these people has been published anywhere.

Late last year, the US Treasury Department, referring to reports by NGOs, said in its website that “Rab and other Bangladeshi law enforcement are responsible for more than 600 disappearances since 2009”.

The US on December 10 last year imposed sanctions on Benazir and six other former and current Rab officials for alleged human rights violations.

“In 2009, I was working as the first secretary of the Bangladesh mission in New York …

“I joined Rab in 2015. So why was I included in that list?” asked the IGP while addressing a civic reception accorded to him in New York on Thursday, said a Police Headquarters press release today (September 2, 2022).

As a member of the Bangladesh delegation led by Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan, Benazir is now in New York to attend the United Nations Chiefs of Police Summit.

The IGP said, “I don’t want to blame the US administration or the Americans, because it was done by those who did not vote for Bangabandhu’s boat in the 1970 election and those who were against the Liberation War in 1971.”

He further said the group hired four lobbyist firms at an annual cost of $25 million, and those firms spent three years lobbying for the “so-called” sanctions.

The IGP said it was once thought that social media would revolutionise journalism, but now fake information is being circulated through it.

Without mentioning any names, he said there are 22 “information terrorists”, and they have to answer.

“Information terrorists are against the country; they are spreading propaganda against humanity. Dirty things should be discarded as soon as they are seen on Facebook, and the truth must be presented…” the police chief said.

The press release said Hindal Qadir Bappa, leader of the Awami League unit in the US, presided over the event. Mohammad Monirul Islam, the consul general of Bangladesh in New York, was also present.