Writing on politics, elections, corruption, human rights etc .. with particular interest in Bangladesh. Most recently Netra News, Al Jazeera, Channel 4 News
London, England
Joined March 2009
- Tweets9.5K
- Following880
- Followers83.5K
- Likes244
In assessing the independence of the International Crimes Tribunal's two courts in #Bangladesh - now engaged with prosecutions for Crimes against Humanity relating to the July 2024 protests and other killings/disappearances during the Awami League period - four facts about the cases brought before them (since August 2024) are worth considering;
Bail
Out of over more than 150 detained, neither court has released on bail a single person it has in their custody, even though many detainees have been held for more than two years without being charged, many have significant ill health issues, many are elderly, and the allegations against many are weak.
Cognisance
In no case has the either court declined to take cognisance of a formal charge against any accused.
Charge framing
Neither court has rejected a single prosecution application to frame charges, or upheld a single discharge application, for any accused facing a formal charge.
Verdicts
In both courts, every accused who has gone to trial has been convicted of at least one offence - though one person, who turned approver, was pardoned.
Yet in Bangladesh we don't hear any criticisms of the ICT from those who were highly critical, legitimately, of the trials at the same courts during the Awami League period. "One rule for us. Another rule for our political opponents."
দুর্নীতিবিরোধী বিশেষজ্ঞরা বলছেন, #Bangladesh-এর পররাষ্ট্রমন্ত্রী ও সম্প্রতি নির্বাচিত জাতিসংঘ সাধারণ পরিষদের সভাপতি খলিলুর রহমান জাইমা রহমানকে নিয়োগ দিয়ে সাধারণ পরিষদের সভাপতির নৈতিক আচরণবিধি লঙ্ঘন করেছেন বলে প্রতীয়মান হয়। জাইমা রহমানের বাবা, বাংলাদেশের প্রধানমন্ত্রী, খলিলুর রহমানকে পররাষ্ট্রমন্ত্রী হিসেবে নিয়োগ দিয়েছিলেন। @NetraNews
netra.news/2026/zaima-rahman…
ইংরেজিতে মূল প্রতিবেদন এখানে: netra.news/2026/zaima-rahman…
BREAKING: Anti-corruption experts say Khalilur Rahman, #Bangladesh's foreign minister, and recently elected UN President, appears to have breached the UN President's Code of Ethics by recruiting Zaima Rahman, whose father, Bangladesh's prime minister, appointed him foreign minister @NetraNews netra.news/2026/zaima-rahman…
Of the growing number of arrests at the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) in #Bangladesh that look more like retribution than legitimate accountability, few seem as nakedly political as these. Link in comments
আন্তর্জাতিক অপরাধ ট্রাইব্যুনাল: যে আদালত জবাবদিহি করতে বাধ্য নন prothomalo.com/opinion/colum…
The English language version of the article is here en.prothomalo.com/opinion/op…
Rather naive. “Robi says he is being harassed for no reason. Fine. That's for the court to decide. Lay the evidence out, test it, and let the verdict land where it lands.” If he is not who you claim him to be, he is going to be deprived of his liberty for a very long time, totally unnecessarily. This is how arbitrary detentions take place
On 23 September, I wrote about Rabiul Islam Robi. An Indian national who had been slipping in and out of Bangladesh for years crossed at Satkhira this time and met people from a banned outfit and gathered sensitive information. We asked for one thing: question him properly. Don't let this end the way the others did.
The Detective Branch today filed a case against him at Uttara West Police Station under the Official Secrets Act, and a Dhaka court sent him on seven days' remand.
The case says he used business as cover, stayed in contact with a foreign intelligence agency, and tried to pass on photographs of government installations, restricted areas and sensitive documents. Police say he entered through the Bhomra land port on 14 September, that his Indian passport lists Riyadh as his birthplace, and that he has been visiting mostly on tourist visas for 10 to 12 years.
Charging an Indian citizen under official secrets acts and accusing him of espionage activities, by name, in open court, tells Delhi that Bangladesh is nobody's backyard. I'll give credit where it's due. This took nerve, and the government found it.
Robi says he is being harassed for no reason. Fine. That's for the court to decide. Lay the evidence out, test it, and let the verdict land where it lands.
But one lesson is already clear. A country that wants respect has to hold its own ground. Today, Bangladesh did.
Involving yourself in these kinds of events only serves to confirm that you have aligned yourself closely to one side. I have not listened to the whole thing but did you or any of the speakers accept and take responsibility for AL’s serious human rights violations - including its role in the killing of hundreds during the protests - during their recent terms of government? The answer is “No”.
Ir is true that the new government, the BNP, is responsible for a high level of arbitrary detentions and the removal of civil and political rights of those aligned to the Awami League, and this needs to be called out.
However these one sided diatribes at this conference, have zero to do with any kind of reconciliation!
Channeling my Mo Mowlam powers on Bangladesh. Everyone is whistling to the same tune, so why is Bangladesh such a mess on the political front?
@TheDavidBergman @nomhossain
@CharlesTannock @jeremycorbyn
@albd1971 @bdbnp78
It all depends on what you mean by the term "English": an ethnic or a national/political group. If you are referring to English as an ethnic group, I can't see how someone can say they are English when they are not descended from, or recognised as belonging to, that group (just as I could never say I was Bengali, for example). If, however, you are referring to English as a national/political identity, then saying you are English is fine. The problem with this debate is that people do not define their terms
Novato media seem to be spinning this a particular way, but Emily Thornberry gave a good explanation for her previous statement.
"I don't quite know where I got it wrong."
At Labour party conference, Novara Media's @MichaeljsWalker asked Emily Thornberry whether she regretted her comments that Israel had an "absolute right to defend itself" when asked if cutting off food, water and electricity to Gaza was within international law.
The comments were made to BBC Newsnight in 2023 when she was shadow Attorney General.
"I will stick my neck out. If #Bangladesh prosecutors bring a formal charge against Chowdhury in November, it will be evidentially unfounded, and built on a misunderstanding and misapplication of the offence of crime against humanity. It will be little different from the baseless charges brought against the journalists Mozammel Babu and Farzana Rupa, as well as a number of others, who now face nothing more at the ICT than political retribution." dailywaadaa.com/reflections/…
The prolonged detention, over two years, of Sheikh Hasina's former energy adviser, who remains uncharged with any offence, raises hard questions about the purpose of #Bangladesh's International Crimes Tribunal. My piece in the @DailyWaadaa dailywaadaa.com/reflections/…
"The consequences at #Bangladesh's International Crimes Tribunal are already visible. Many accused have been held for more than a year without formal charges, in apparent breach of the tribunal's own rules. The tribunal has taken cognisance of formal charges and framed charges where there was no legal basis for doing so – often reflecting a fundamental misunderstanding of the offence of crimes against humanity." See here @ProthomAlo
en.prothomalo.com/opinion/op…
The International Crimes Tribunal cases against the journalists highlighted by @CPJAsia are among a growing number of politically driven indictments at the court accusing opeople linked to the Awami League of crimes against humanity. Apart from the injustice to the accused involved in these cases, these illegitimate prosecutions damage the credibility of the tribunal's other cases, those that do rest on real evidence of involvement in crimes.
#Bangladesh: In an unprecedented move, Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal is pursuing crimes-against-humanity charges against three journalists over their journalism. CPJ’s Somi Das breaks down the cases and explains why criminalizing journalistic work in this way is deeply troubling for press freedom.
Read more: cpj.org/2026/07/bangladesh-c… & cpj.org/2026/08/bangladesh-w…
#PressFreedom #JournalismIsNotACrime