Sector Commanders Forum – Liberation War’71 has sent a letter to the secretary general of Amnesty International, protesting the human rights watchdog’s recent statement suggesting that freedom fighters should also be put on trial for crimes committed during the war.
“Since the beginning of the Bangladesh’s trial of international crimes in 2010, Amnesty International has never recognised the right of the victims for justice, but always highlighted the rights of the accused in the dock,” the letter from Sector Commanders Forum reads.
“To draw any equivalency between the freedom fighters, who fought for the fundamental democratic rights of their nation, and the war criminals, who trampled the electoral verdict and attacked unarmed civilians systematically and brutally, is no doubt a wilful blindness on the part of Amnesty International,” the letter added.
In a report published on October 27, Amnesty International criticised the ongoing war crime trials in Bangladesh, and said: “Serious crimes were also committed by the pro-independence forces, but no one has been probed or brought to justice for them.”
Speaking at a press conference at the National Press Club yesterday, International Crimes Tribunal prosecutor barrister Tureen Afroz said the impertinence of Amnesty International had exceeded too much in suggesting a trial against freedom fighters. “Amnesty International only considered war criminals as human beings and were oblivious about the victims.”
Tureen said anyone demanding that freedom fighters be put on trial was speaking the language of war criminals.
The letter by the forum condemned Amnesty International’s claims that the trials of war criminals SQ Chowdhury and Ali Ahsan Muhammad Mujahid had “serious flaws.” The letter also criticised the watchdog’s comment that almost all verdicts of the tribunal had “come against members of opposition parties.”
The Sector Commanders Forum pointed out: “They [SQ Chowdhury and Mujahid] were found guilty by the highest court of the country for their crimes against humanity committed during the Bangladesh War, not for their role as opposition politicians today.”
The letter further read: “By issuing a statement like this, the Amnesty International had also commented on a sub-judice matter, which we consider a clear interference into the judicial process of a sovereign country.”
