Former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who was ousted in a student-public uprising, will be asked to return her back from India, said Dr. Muhammad Yunus, the chief adviser to the interim government.
He said this in his address to the nation on Sunday (November 17) at 7 pm on the occasion of the 100th day of the interim government.
He also said, we all have to rebuild this country, which has been devastated by dictatorship. After the July-August revolution, we got a country in which there was chaos everywhere. To maintain the dictatorship, the law and order forces were made to stand in front of the people. During the revolution, about 1500 students and workers died as martyrs.
Our government is collecting information about each death with great care. 19,931 people were injured in this revolution. Treatment arrangements have been made for the injured in various specialized hospitals, including 13 hospitals in Dhaka. Every day, more and more information about martyrs who have left this world as victims of the tyranny is being added to the list. We will prosecute every murder. The initiative we have taken to prosecute the July-August murders is also progressing very well. We will also demand the return of the fallen dictator Sheikh Hasina from India.
The chief adviser said, we will not only prosecute the July-August murders, we will prosecute all the crimes committed in the last 15 years. Innumerable people have been disappeared and murdered during this period. We have formed a commission to investigate the disappearances. The head of the commission told me that they have received information about the disappearances of 1,600 people till October. They estimate that this number will exceed 3,500. Many are afraid to file a complaint about disappearances with the commission, thinking that they may be attacked and harmed again by the accused persons. I want to assure you that you should file your complaint with the commission without hesitation. No one has the capacity to touch you again.
Dr. Yunus said, after the July-August revolution, students have written their thoughts on the walls of the city and port. Those who were victims of disappearances before them have written touching accounts of their suffering on the walls of every secret shelter. Our hearts are touched by hearing their suffering.
We will bring those involved in these to justice. No matter how powerful the accused is, no matter which force he belongs to, there is no chance of giving him any leeway. Not only in the country, but we have also taken the initiative to try those involved in disappearances, murders and the July-August genocide in the international court.
I have already spoken to the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, in this regard. He also said, we have signed the International Convention against Disappearances so that no member of the law enforcement agencies or anyone else can be involved in such crimes as murders, disappearances. As you have seen, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Falk Turk, recently visited Bangladesh.
The United Nations has extended its support to us in the investigation of the July-August killings. They have promised to hand over their report to us in the first week of December. We have also been in regular contact with them in the investigation of past disappearances. They have offered to increase their manpower in Dhaka to assist in protecting human rights. We have accepted this offer.