On June 12, 2023, six parliamentarians spanning around the European Union addressed a letter to Joseph Borrell, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, urging strong punitive actions against the administration of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for its gross violations of human rights and democratic malpractices and other wrongdoings. This was needed “to restore democracy and rule of law in view of the upcoming general elections,” they asserted.
(A former President of the European Parliament (2004-2007), Borrell also serves as the Vice-President of the European Commission. He had also been a Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation (2018-2019).
The Coalition for Human Rights & Democracy in Bangladesh (CHRD Bangladesh) greatly welcomes the timely initiative of the European political leaders and looks forward to a positive outcome so that democracy, human rights, and the rule of law can be restored in Bangladesh at the quickest.
The abuses of the Sheikh Hasina regime include “extrajudicial killings, abductions, torture and false cases” against its political opponents. The notorious Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) and police are extensively used to perpetrating these crimes. Citizens’ freedom of expression has been silenced under the draconian Digital Security Act (DSA); nobody can criticize the government, its random corruption, and extensive wrongdoings, as well as the ruling family under the Act.
Citing extensive rigging and midnight balloting by the regime and non-participation of the leading opposition parties, the letter terms the Hasina government to “have no or little mandate from the people of Bangladesh.” The lawmakers believed that the “EU has strong reasons to stand with the people of Bangladesh,” who continue to suffer under the undemocratic and repressive rule of Hasina for the last 15 years.
Other key points in the letter were seeking the release of opposition leader Begum Khaleda Zia, the ailing former prime minister, who has been wrongly convicted to suffer 17 years in solitary prison and holding the next parliamentary election under a neutral caretaker administration.