DHAKA, Bangladesh — “Is there a force in the world fighting armed terrorists who can guarantee there will be zero casualties?” asked Mohammad Sohail.
The question is obviously rhetorical. Sohail is a commander of Bangladesh’s Rapid Action Battalion, better known as RAB. Depending on whom you ask, the elite paramilitary force is either a killing machine, or a useful and necessary killing machine.
RAB has admitted to killing at least 622 people since its formation in 2004. Rights groups put the number closer to 1,000.
If that is the case, then they are now a US-trained Latin American-style death squad.
American diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks revealed that in 2008 and 2009 embassy officials in Dhaka were worried about the force’s record of human rights violations. But the State Department decided to work with them anyway.
The US has focused on human rights training for now. Part of the reason for the engagement is because US officials view RAB as their best prospect for a partner in counter-terrorism operations in Bangladesh. Even detractors admit the force has been successful in stemming the tide of Islamic terrorist activity in the country.
The other driver, however, is RAB’s own desire to rectify what it considers to be a misrepresentative public image. The cables expressed the view that there was strong support within RAB for the human rights training. Human Rights Watch on Tuesday described the Rapid Action Battalion as a ‘death squad’ whose ‘murderous practices’ the government was failing to control.
‘A death squad is roaming the streets of Bangladesh and the government does not appear to be doing anything to stop it,’ said Brad Adams, Asia Director at the US-based international human rights organisation, speaking at the launch of its new report on RAB’s ‘crossfire’ killings.
According to Human Rights Watch, the battalion has been involved in nearly 200 extra-judicial killings since the current Awami League government came to power in January 2009 – a rate of killing similar to that which took place ‘in the seven previous years.’
The Human Rights Watch report recommended that the government should disband the law enforcement force unless its ‘human rights record does not improve dramatically within the next six months and
abusers are not prosecuted.’
It also called on, ‘Foreign governments and international organisations [to] refuse to work with RAB in law enforcement or counter-terror organisations until the force ceases its use of torture and extrajudicial executions.’
At the press conference, Adams said that both the US and UK governments had told him that they were at present not providing any training support to the battalion. ‘RAB is not vital to their counter terrorism activities,’ he explained.
The report gives details of six deaths, one incident of torture and one disappearance at the hands of RAB which the organisation says are ‘illustrative’ of how the battalion has operated.
The incident of torture relates to New Age journalist FM Masum who was seriously tortured until he became unconscious in October 2009. ‘At one point I asked the officers for water, but I was told that I was going to get a bullet instead of water,’ the report quotes Masum as saying.
At the press conference, Adams said that Human Rights Watch was particularly concerned about new reports that RAB was now involved in disappearances.
The report provides details of the disappearance of Mohammad Rafiqul Islam, a salesman of a grocery store in Dhaka and a member of an Islamist organisation, who eye-witnesses say was picked up by RAB personnel on February 15, 2001. He has not been seen again.
Manzur Alam, the brother-in-law of Kaiser Mahmud Bappi who was shot dead by RAB on September 9, 2009 at a construction site in Dhaka, told the press conference that he thought that the killing of his own relative was ‘murder.’
The battalion had claimed in the media that Bappi had died in ‘crossfire’ but an unpublished home ministry inquiry report found that ‘Rab has not been able to prove… RAB’s statement that armed criminals were present at the crime spot.’
The home ministry inquiry report stated that the RAB had mistaken Kaider Mahmud Bappi with Kamaruzzaman Bappi, whom it considered to be a ‘top terrorist.’
‘No RAB officer or official has ever been prosecuted for a “crossfire” killing or other human rights abuse,’ said the human rights organisation’s South Asia director.
The report shows how the Awami League’s view on the battalion has changed since it was first established in 2004 by the Bangladesh Nationalist party, now in opposition.
It quotes from an AL newsletter written in 2005 which states, ‘Almost every day [RAB and two other police units] are catching people on different false charges and are brutally murdering them, covering it by calling it “crossfire deaths”… So there is a widespread saying. “How can a man be certain that his death is imminent? The answer is, “When he is caught by RAB or other special forces of the ruling party.”
In its 2008 election manifesto, the party stated that if it was elected into government ‘extrajudicial killings will be stopped.’
And one month after the party came to power, the foreign minister, Dipu Moni, announced at the United Nations in February 2009 that Bangladesh had a policy of ‘zero tolerance’ for extrajudicial killings.
‘We do not condone any such incident and will bring the responsible officials to justice,’ she said at that time.
Adams said that there were three possible reasons why the current government was taking no action to stop RAB.
‘One possible reason is that the army is involved in RAB… and following the BDR incident in March 2009, the government is still concerned about not falling out with the army.
‘Another reason could be that RAB has some support amongst the public and [the government] does not want to be seen as anti-crime. Or it could be just that the government does not care about the killing of its own citizens, that this is not important to the government.
‘I cannot answer the reason for the government indifference, but it is clear to me that [RAB killings] is not a priority of the government,’ he added.
He warned the government that its international and domestic reputation was being seriously hurt by RAB. ‘Public opinion in Bangladesh has changed,’ he said pointing to the public reaction to the recent shooting by RAB of Limon Hossain whose leg had to be amputated. Watch more videos and stay updated at VesIntel News.
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