Dhaka, Mar 28 (bdnews24.com)—The Rapid Action Battalion is always mindful of human rights violations while performing their duties, the chief of the elite force said Sunday.
"Experts train them using examples of different human rights issues of many countries," Khandaker Hassan Mahmood, the RAB director general, said at the force's yearly evaluation meeting with the journalists.
He said authorities take necessary legal measures after investigating any allegations against members of the force. "Steps have been taken against many in the past, including dismissal from jobs," Mahmood said.
The RAB DG, however, said, "We don't claim that we're hundred percent successful as a law enforcing agency since we've some faults and we fail too.
"But the rate of success is higher than the other agencies," he added.
Mahmood also presented the success story of the elite force in providing security on different special days and events.
Regarding deaths by so-called 'crossfire' or 'encounters', Mahmood said that RAB had investigated all the "exchange of fire" incidents that took place in the last one year.
"There's no scope for RAB members to go beyond the rules or law for RAB, and they don't 'consciously', act in this way," he claimed.
Fourteen people were killed in "gunfights" with the RAB last year, he said, while the total number killed since it was established stands at 622, he said.
These comments come a week after the closure by the police of an exhibition on 'Crossfire' at the Drik Gallery. Local and international human rights organisations have for many years expressed concern about 'crossfire' deaths or extra judicial killings in Bangladesh.
Most recently, a US State Department's Human Rights Report on Bangladesh, released on Mar 12 – quoting local media reports, local and international human rights groups, and the government – said law enforcement officials were responsible for 154 deaths, 129 of which were attributed to 'crossfire' in 2009, representing a 3 percent increase from the previous year.
The report went on to say that RAB accounted for 38 of the crossfire killings.
Mahmood told the journalists that RAB forces around the country conducted many special drives against terrorism, extortion, drugs trading and even against illegal VoIP businesses. In these operations RAB members detained around 17,500 people and filed around 6,000 cases.
However he added that, to make the drive against the drug trade "a success, a committee could be formed in the national-level so that all the related agencies can participate."
He also said 'mobile phones', are both a blessing and a 'curse', as these are widely used to extort money from people. "But the problems will ease if the measures regarding SIM registration are effective."
bdnews24.com/sit/pks/db/0001h
