Why not release 2001 minority attack report: HC

The High Court has asked why the report of an investigation into the hate attacks of 2001 immediately after the general elections that the BNP had won should not be released.

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 22 Jan 2014, 03:30 PM
Updated : 22 Jan 2014, 06:01 PM

The Home Secretary has been ordered to reply to the rule in the following two weeks. The court also wants a probe report to be submitted before Feb 2.

The bench of Justices Naima Haider and Zafar Ahmed gave the order on Wednesday.

Hindu homes and businesses have come under a fresh wave of attacks after the Jan 5 parliamentary polls.

Monjil Morshed, on behalf of the Human Rights and Peace for Bangladesh, filed a writ petition with the High Court and conducted the hearing himself.
Morshed argued that the publication of the investigation findings from the hate attacks in 2001 and exemplary judgments could have prevented the post-polls attacks on minorities in 2014.
The NGO had moved the High Court over the violence unleashed on religious minorities in 2001 at the fag end of 2009.
The court, following the petition, ordered retired district judge Md Shahabuddin to lead a three-member commission to probe the incidents.
The commission in 2011 produced a 1,100-page report to the home ministry. But their findings never saw the light of day, as the report was never published.
The former Home Minister Shahara Khatun had said the government had identified 26,365 who she said were involved in attacking Hindus, Awami League leaders and activists after the BNP-Jamaat-e-Islami coalition came to power in 2001.
This was before the commission submitted their report.
She said among the miscreants were 25 former ministers, state ministers and MPs of the BNP and Jamaat.
She said the attacks had been fuelled by the top echelon of the two parties.

File Photo

Among the former ministers, the report named BNP leader Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, Tariqul Islam, Hafizuddin Ahmed, Ruhul Kuddus Talukder Dulu, Abdus Salam Pinto and Jamaat leader Motiur Rahman Nizami who is on trial for war crimes.
MPs Salauddin Quader Chowdhury, Shahidul Haque Jamal, Abdul Wadud Bhuiyan, Nadim Mostafa, Jainal Abedin, AHM Selim, Shahidul Islam, Ilias Ali, Ilen Bhutto, Hafiz Ibrahim, Salauddin Ahmed, Alamgir Haider, Dr Salek Chowdhury, Jahiruddin Swapan, Maulana Sakhawat Hossain and Jamaat leader Delwar Hossain Sayedee, convicted of war crimes, Dr Abu Taher and Abdus Sobhan also came up in the report, the government said.