Making them pay for war crimes

A War Crimes Tribunal in Bangladesh has since 2010 tried those against whom evidence has been painstakingly gathered by former freedom fighters, both civilian and military, and by the non-government bodies. It remains a sensitive issue in a country where emotions run high.

The trials are being held by what the government calls “International Tribunals,” supposed to follow the Nuremberg and Bosnia trials. Russian Ambassador in Dhaka Alexander A Nikolaev has dismissed the charge of political vendetta against the Hasina government. The key message of the Nuremberg trials, he recalled, was not about taking revenge but retribution for crimes against humanity

Bangladesh is keeping its tryst with its past. People accused of “war crimes” – of carrying out atrocities on unarmed civilians during the nine month-long civil war against Pakistan in 1971 – are being tried and punished. Two of them were hanged last Sunday.

The overwhelming sentiment, even after four decades, is that justice should be done and that crime should not pay. But the critics of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her Awami League, mainly the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its Islamist allies like the Jamaat-e-Islami whose leaders have been the principal accused and conservative classes, are opposing them. Those being charged with “war crimes” are mainly Jamaat leaders who as youth leaders had formed armed militia like Al Shams and Al Badr that acted in support of the Pakistan Army and the then East Pakistan authorities.

Reports of that era and after Bangladesh’s independence clearly indicate that the militias engaged in large-scale killing, loot, arson, rape and abduction targeting freedom fighters and religious minorities, particularly the Hindus, forcing millions to flee to India. Bangladesh claims three million people were killed, besides other crimes. Estimates have varied.

Independent assessments place the casualties at between two and three lakhs. Hasina vowed to hold the trials on returning to power in 2009. A War Crimes Tribunal has since 2010 tried those against whom evidence has been painstakingly gathered by former freedom fighters, both civilian and military, and by the non-government bodies. It remains a sensitive issue in a country where emotions run high.

The trials are being held by what the government calls “International Tribunals,” supposed to follow the Nuremberg and Bosnia trials. The domestic opposition and the global human right bodies have disputed this, saying the procedures are ‘flawed’ and deny the accused a fair trial. Jamaat was banned for openly opposing the freedom movement. Many of its leaders managed to flee to Pakistan via the porous Indian border. Others lay low to return to the political arena after the assassination of Hasina’s father and Bangladesh’s founding leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in August 1975.

Subsequent military or military-backed governments that ruled for the next 15 years legitimised the Jamaat and much that militated against the ethos the freedom movement had generated. The Jamaat has emerged as the chief Islamist political force in a conservative, overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim nation. Among those convicted are 15 belonging to the Jamaat, of whom three have been hanged. Ali Ahsan Mohammed Mujahid was a minister in the government (2001-06) of Begum Khaleda Zia. Her greater loss, however, is the hanging of Salauddin Qader Chowdhury, a BNP Presidium Member and six-term parliamentarian.

As has happened this week, each verdict of the tribunal and each hanging have been followed by large-scale violence that has impacted normal life in Bangladesh for the past five years. The trials-and-punishment process has prolonged because Begum Zia and her allies made the tactical error of boycotting the elections in 2014. Sheikh Hasina won that election virtually unopposed. That gave her a mandate that, while being technically right, has been criticised by the West.

The hangings were carried out after the President rejected the mercy pleas of the two and the country’s Supreme Court rejected the review petitions. The court did not find any error or illegality in its earlier judgments that upheld their death sentences awarded by the War Crimes Tribunal. An influential leader from Chittagong, Salahuddin claimed that he was in Karachi in April 1971 when he was accused of the crimes.

In its verdict on his petition, the top court said the certificate, submitted by Salahuddin in support of this claim “was forged, apparently to confuse the court.” The apex court observed that Salauddin was not only physically present in the brutal and diabolical incidents of crimes, but also actively participated in those killings. He also showed no repentance or remorse for his conduct at any point of time. Rather, he expressed disdain towards the trial process.

The apex court observed that the barbaric, gruesome and brutal crimes committed by Mojaheed were comparable with Hitler's Gas Chamber Genocide or Jallianwala Bagh massacre” (in Punjub on April 13, 1919, when the British Indian Army fired on innocent civilians killing hundreds).

It said Mojaheed's Al-Badr Bahini had, instigated, provoked and incited by him, kidnapped and killed intellectuals, which was “a cold-blooded savagery.” “Does Islam permit killing of those unarmed people? While awarding the sentence, the court must take into consideration the unbearable pains, tears rolling down the cheeks and sufferings of the widows and children of the victims, who cried for getting justice for about 43 years,” the apex court, presided over by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha, who is the first top judge from the Hindu minority, observed.

Justice Hasan Foez Siddique wrote the verdict. Lady judge Nazmun Ara Sultana and Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain agreed with them. The trials have a larger context. Pakistan has, of course, condemned the trials and hangings. But more interesting is the persistence of the cold war era line-up after four decades, which supported and opposed Bangladesh’s freedom movement.

It may be recalled that the United States under President Ronald Reagan, advised by Henry Kissinger, his Secretary of State, had opposed the freedom struggle and had fully backed the military rulers of Pakistan.

By contrast, the then Soviet Union had been sympathetic. Upon signing the Treaty of Peace with India, it backed India militarily and diplomatically, particularly at the UN Security Council where the diplomatic war reached its crescendo, even as India-Bangladesh forces captured Dhaka and secured the surrender of the Pakistani forces.

Influential US lawmakers have been critical of Hasina and her government and of the tribunals. Those overseeing American foreign policy have described the tribunal as "very flawed" and a means of political retribution. Amnesty International has been critical of the trial not having met “international standards.” The Hasina government did seek help from the US, Germany and those Europeans who were engaged in War Crimes trials in Nuremberg and Bosnia before devising its own procedures.

Taking a populist stance, Hasina charged: “Amnesty is trying to protect the murderers like Chowdhury, Mujahid and others. We guess it received good amount of money from the war criminals.” In broad terms, in keeping with its general world view, the US has viewed the ‘nationalist’ Hasina less favourably than Begum Zia.

By contrast, William P Sloan, former president of American Association of Jurists, Canadian chapter, has said that while a State cannot punish all criminals who committed war crimes, it should try and punish the top leaders to establish justice in society and “to end the culture of impunity.”

Russian Ambassador in Dhaka Alexander A Nikolaev has dismissed the charge of political vendetta against the Hasina government. The key message of the Nuremberg trials, he recalled, was not about taking revenge but retribution for crimes against humanity.

The trials and their outcome shall continue to remain a sensitive, even if contentious, issue in Bangladesh. But that is not an end in itself for Hasina who faces opposition from

extremist groups from within and without. Foreigners and bloggers who propagate secularism have been killed. That the Islamic State (IS) has identified ‘Bengal’ and its chief has appointed a “regional leader” for Bangladesh is a serious threat to Bangladesh. Neighbouring India, too, must prepare to meet the IS threat that takes leap from Afghanistan and Pakistan in the west to Bangladesh in the east.