DHAKA: Thirteen Bang­la­deshi former top gover­n­ment officials arrested after the revolution in August appeared in court on Monday accused of “enabling massacres”, with prosecutors repeating extradition demands for exiled ex-leader Sheikh Hasina.

Dozens of Hasina’s allies have been taken into custody since her regime collapsed, accused of involvement in a police crackdown that killed more than 700 people during the unrest that led to her ouster.

Prosecutor Mohammad Tajul Islam said the 13 defendants, who included 11 former ministers, a judge and an ex-government secretary, were accused of command responsibility for the deadly crackdown on the student-led protest that ousted the regime.

Hasina, who fled to old ally India by helicopter on August 5, was also due in court in Dhaka on Monday to face charges of “massacres, killings, and crimes against humanity”, but she remained a fugitive in exile. “We have produced 13 defendants today, including 11 former ministers, a bureaucrat, and a judge,” Islam, the chief prosecutor of Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal, told reporters.

“They are complicit in enabling massacres by participating in planning, inciting violence, ordering law enforcement officers to shoot on sight, and obstructing efforts to prevent a genocide.” Around half a dozen lawyers supported the defendants, who were brought from custody and led into court surrounded by a ring of security forces to separate them from the large crowd outside.

Hasina’s 15-year tenure saw widespread human rights abuses, including the mass detention and extrajudicial killings of her political opponents.

The charges the 13 face are so far limited to the police crackdown on student-led protests, but Islam requested more time to compile evidence stretching back further.

Published in Dawn, November 19th, 2024