Bangladeshi authorities must ensure justice to the Noakhali woman, who was stripped and severely beaten by a group of men for around half an hour, as a video of the incident emerged online.
Amnesty International issued a statement in this regard on Tuesday.
On Sunday, a video was posted on social media which recorded from start to finish the torture act which is believed to have taken place on September 2.
This is the latest incident in an escalating wave of violence against women in the country, the statement said.
“This truly disturbing footage demonstrates the shocking violence that Bangladeshi women are routinely being subjected to.
“In the vast majority of these cases, the justice system fails to hold the perpetrators responsible,” said Sultan Mohammed Zakaria, South Asia researcher at Amnesty International.
“There can be no excuses here – the Bangladeshi authorities must immediately launch a thorough and impartial investigation and bring those responsible for this vicious attack to justice through fair trials without recourse to the death penalty,” he added.
Between 2001 and July 2020, only 3.56% of cases filed under the Prevention of Oppression Against Women and Children Act 2000 Act have resulted in a court judgment and only 0.37% of cases have ended with convictions, according to data from the government’s One Stop Crisis Centre.
Local women’s rights organization Naripokkho examined the incidents of reported rape cases in six districts between 2011 and 2018 and found that out of 4,372 cases, only five people were convicted, Amnesty also said.
According to human rights organization Ain-o-Salish Kendra (ASK), between January and September 2020, at least 975 rape cases were reported in Bangladesh, including 208 gang-rapes, the statement further mentioned.
Human rights organizations and local civil society blame the flawed criminal justice system, undermined by weak investigation processes and poor evidence management, for the appallingly low number of convictions, Amnesty also said.
The persistent failure to protect victims and witnesses is also a major source of concern, with women fearing stigmatization and not feeling safe reporting the crimes committed against them, it added.
On September 25, another woman was allegedly gang-raped by a group of seven men affiliated with the ruling Awami League party’s student wing in the north-eastern district Sylhet’s MC College.
The woman was visiting the area with her husband when the perpetrators allegedly attacked them and dragged the woman into a dormitory before tying up and beating her husband and gang-raping her. The accused have all been arrested by local police officers and are under investigation.
Following a mass public outcry after the video of the attack in Noakhali was posted online, civil society, political, and human rights activists organized a protest in Dhaka on Monday.
“Women in Bangladesh are being failed by a criminal justice system that puts them at greater risk.
“Urgent reform is needed to strengthen how these cases are investigated, to support and protect victims and witnesses, and to speed up the painfully slow trial process,” Sultan concluded.
