Veteran journalist Shafik Rehman has accused the previous government of filing false cases to suppress freedom of speech.
He made the statement while speaking in front of the Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Court on Monday.
Shafik appeared at the court at 10:30am following a one-year suspension of his sentence, granted on Sunday, with the condition that he file an appeal after surrendering to the court.
He said: "The government took away the people's freedom of speech, and we have been deprived of it as well. Both the public and readers were silenced. A false case was filed against me to stifle journalism and suppress the voice of the people."
On August 17, 2023, Dhaka's Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Asaduzzaman Noor sentenced five individuals, including Shafik Rehman and Mahmudur Rahman, acting editor of Dainik Amar Desh, to seven years in prison.
The Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Court on Monday withdrew the arrest warrant issued for Shafik Rehman in the case lodged for plotting to abduct and murder ousted prime minister Sheikh Hasina's son Sajeeb Wazed Joy in the US in 2015.
Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Mahbubul Haque passed the order as Shafik surrendered before the court and pleaded to withdraw the
warrant against him for filing an appeal against his conviction in the case.
"Earlier on September 22, the home ministry suspended Rehman's sentence for a year on the condition of surrendering before the lower court and filing an
appeal against his conviction," defence counsel Syed Joynul Abedin Mejbah told BSS.
