Author: Ruth Baldwin
Publication: The Nation
Date: May 17, 2002
URL: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=special&s=baldwin20020517
"I stand before you all today with
a heavy heart to tell the tales of the endless raging minority cleansing
campaign," declared Dwijen Bhattacharjya at the International Conference
on Minority Cleansing in Bangladesh, held on April 28 at a cavernous Indian
restaurant in Queens. "From Barisal in the south, to Savar in the center,
to Rajshai in the north, the trails of terror have swept across Bangladesh."
While the media spotlight has been
focused on Pakistan and Afghanistan, the rise of fundamentalism in nearby
Bangladesh has gone virtually unnoticed. The nation's tradition of moderate
Islam is under threat as religious intolerance takes hold following the
victory of the Bangladesh National Party (BNP) in last October's elections.
"What is happening?" writes Shahriar Kabir, a documentary filmmaker based
in Dhaka, is the initial stage of the "Talibanizing of Bangladesh's politics
and society."
The BNP is led by Khaleda Zia, widow
of the assassinated military dictator General Zia, who amended the original
Constitution, replacing secularism with the "Sovereignty of Allah." Khaleda
Zia was swift to condemn the September 11 attacks and offer support to
America before the elections. But the fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami party
is a key partner in her governing coalition. The party has argued that
strict Islamic Sharia law should be implemented in Bangladesh, just as
it was by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Jamaat collaborated with Pakistan
during the bloody 1971 war of liberation, and the seventeen parliamentary
seats that they gained in October are the first they have ever won.
Concern over the escalation of violence
against the minority population following the BNP- Jamaat victory had brought
Bangladeshi-Americans, congressmen, journalists and civil rights activists
together on this rainy Sunday afternoon in Queens. Hindu, Buddhist and
Christian communities, which represent 10 percent of Bangladesh's population
of 130 million, have been terrorized collectively; secular Muslims, individually.
Bidyut Saker, head of the New York-based Bangladeshi Hindus of America,
reports that at least forty minority people have been murdered and thousands
beaten; hundreds of temples desecrated and statues destroyed; thousands
of homes and businesses looted or burned. William Sloan, president of the
Canadian branch of the American Association of Jurors, visited Bangladesh
in February and described his horror on seeing Hindu victims of torture.
One man's fingers had been cut off, another's hand was amputated, still
more were blinded and others had iron rods nailed through their legs or
abdomen. He also recalled the desperate stories of women and children who
had been gang-raped, often in front of their fathers or husbands. Last
December Amnesty International reported that "over 100 women may have been
subjected to rape?" and all evidence "persistently allege[s] that the perpetrators
have been mainly members of the BNP or its coalition partner Jamaat-e-Islami."
Attorney Elizabeth Barna, a speaker at the conference who handles asylum
applications for many Bangladeshis, contends that the "number is more likely
to lie in the thousands." In a society where virginity is a prerequisite
for marriage, only a fraction of women ever report such attacks. This culture
of fear and violence has triggered an exodus to India. Jana Masen, Asia
Policy Advisor at the World Refugee Survey, estimates that up to 20,000
people have fled across the border since October.
The gathering also addressed the
suppression of the press and intimidation of journalists, in particular
filmmaker Shahriar Kabir. Kabir has dedicated his life to exposing those
responsible for crimes against religious minorities. His 1993 film Cry
for Justice documented the complicity of two Jamaat leaders, Matiur Rahman
Nizami and Delwar Hossain Sayedee, in the genocide of 3 million people
during the 1971 war of liberation. Last November Kabir was in Calcutta
filming the statements of Hindu refugees who had recently fled Bangladesh
for his new documentary, Cry for Amity. On his return to Dhaka, he was
arrested on charges of treason, and his passport, videotapes and camera
were confiscated. Detained under the Special Powers Act of 1974, he spent
fifty-nine days in the notoriously overcrowded Dhaka Central Jail. Amnesty
International declared him a "prisoner of conscience." In response to a
habeas corpus petition, the High Court bench declared the extension of
Kabir's detention illegal, and on January 20 he was granted six months'
interim bail. But his persecution continues. As Kabir recently wrote to
me: "My life is under threat from religio extremists and fanatic Mullahs.
A very eminent Mullah named Maolana Delwar Hossain Sayedee, who is also
a parliament member and a leader of Jamaat-e-Islami, issued Fatwah (religious
decree) declaring me a Murtad (a person eligible to kill)."
Kabir's experience recalls the harrowing
plight of Taslima Nasrin, who wrote about the last wave of violence to
engulf the country a decade ago. In 1992 Hindu fanatics demolished the
Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India, claiming it had been built on the birthplace
of the god Lord Rama. Muslims reacted with a campaign of retaliatory rage
which spread to Bangladesh. Nasrin, appalled by what she witnessed, described
the horrifying experience of one Hindu family in her novel Shame, published
in 1993. She was placed under fatwa by Muslim leaders and, fearing for
her life, fled to Europe, where she still lives.
While the atrocities Nasrin described
were triggered by events in India, the current
pogrom is being directed from within
Bangladesh. During the main Eid al-Fitr congregation in December at the
national mosque, the chief imam proclaimed in the presence of Cabinet ministers
and thousands of people: "President Bush and America is the most heinous
terrorist in the world." He continued, "The Americans will be washed away
if Bangladesh's 120 million [sic] Muslims spit on them." A few weeks later
Delwar Hossain Sayedee, the Jamaat leader who subsequently placed Kabir
under fatwa, decreed that all statues except those of Muslim worshipers
should be destroyed. The Hindustan Times reported in January that eighteen
terrorist training camps backed by the Pakistani Inter- Services Intelligence
directorate are currently operating in Bangladesh. Several are run by Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami,
which is believed to have been founded in 1992 with money from Osama bin
Laden. A more insidious threat is posed by the exponential growth of madrassahs,
or religious schools, in the last decade. The April Far Eastern Economic
Review revealed that 64,000 are operating throughout Bangladesh. These
are described by a retired high-ranking civil servant as a "potential political
time bomb."
The conclusion of those speaking
at the conference in Queens is that this situation can be defused only
if Khaleda Zia is pressured by George Bush and his Western allies into
meeting certain conditions. These include: restoring secularism to the
Constitution and "promoting a pluralistic democracy"; ordering members
of the BNP alliance to stop their persecution of religious minorities;
instructing the police "to protect the minority communities"; the repatriation
of "refugees and displaced people"; the formation of an "independent commission
to investigate the atrocities"; and the introduction of a "Minority Protection
Act, which must include an Affirmative Action Law and a Hate Crime Law."
Unable to leave Dhaka and still facing charges of treason that carry a
death sentence, Shahriar Kabir continues to struggle for "secularism, democracy
and human rights." The question remains whether the international community
will live up to its rhetoric and join his fight.