enforced disappearance

Aynaghar should be a site of remembrance

According to the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), at least 623 people were victims of enforced disappearance in the country from 2009 to 2022.

The invisible prisoners of state

The current government must also identify those who have been killed during their disappearances.

'Let my blood bring peace to the sacred soil of Bengal'

If it had not been for the student’s uprising, the heaviness of the pain for many in a similar situation would not have been relieved.

Bangladesh signs UN treaty on enforced disappearances

'It's a historic occasion,' says Yunus after signing instrument of accession to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearances

Enforced disappearance: Govt sets up inquiry commission

The government yesterday formed a five-member inquiry commission to identify and find the people who were forcibly disappeared by various intelligence and law enforcement agencies between January 1, 2010, and August 5, 2024.

EDITORIAL / Dr Yunus’s address and the path forward

Must work together for democracy and reforms

Inside the Aynaghar / ‘Captors kept watch on my family’

On the evening of December 4, 2017, around 6:45pm, M Maroof Zaman, former Bangladesh ambassador to Vietnam, was on his way from his Dhanmondi home to receive his daughter at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport.

Inside the Aynaghar

After years of denial by the authorities, chilling details about secret prisons are now emerging as victims of enforced disappearances begin to speak out after their release following the dramatic fall of Sheikh Hasina’s 16-year regime.

‘Handcuffs, blindfold ... it felt like a grave’

Usually, one sees the families of the victims of enforced disappearances demanding their loved ones be returned. But in a rare occurrence, the survivors came to the fore at a programme yesterday to narrate the ordeals they went through.

May 15, 2022
May 15, 2022

Return of enforced disappearance and extrajudicial killing?

It was a sombre occasion at the Dhaka Reporters Unity premises on April 30.

April 20, 2022
April 20, 2022

An open letter to the makers of ‘Nikhoj’

Dear Reehan Rahman, My father, photojournalist and editor Shafiqul Islam Kajol, was added to the list of hundreds of Bangladeshi victims of enforced disappearance on March 10, 2020.

April 17, 2022
April 17, 2022

Ilias missing: 10 years gone, no trace yet

“We, the family members of the victims of enforced disappearance, have been leading a miserable life.

April 17, 2022
April 17, 2022

Draft OTT regulations: They'll be threat to free speech, says speakers at webinar

The government’s draft regulation for digital, social media and OTT platforms will be a threat to freedom of speech and people’s basic rights, experts said yesterday.

March 17, 2022
March 17, 2022

Bangladesh should respond to UN concerns on human rights: HRW

Human Rights Watch today urged the Bangladesh government to meaningfully respond to United Nations' concerns regarding grave allegations of torture, enforced disappearance, and extrajudicial killings in the country.

August 30, 2019
August 30, 2019

Disappearances: Rights activists demand independent probe body

Rights organisation Mother’s Call holds a discussion on the occasion of the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances at the National Press Club in Dhaka.

December 5, 2018
December 5, 2018

Enforced Disappearance: 40 families'painful wait lingers on

At a crowded room of the capital's Jatiya Press Club yesterday, eight-year old Adiba Islam Hridi cried softly while sitting on her mother's lap.

October 26, 2018
October 26, 2018

'Picked up' pro-AL men return

The three ruling party men, allegedly picked up by plainclothes men from Narayanganj's Rupganj, returned home yesterday.

April 23, 2018
April 23, 2018

Put public concerns at rest

On average, 16 people have become victims of enforced disappearance between 2012 and 2017, which amounts to more than one every month. It is regrettable too that in the four or five years that the afflicted families have been making their annual plea to the government through a press conference, to trace the victims out, their number has risen gradually.

November 17, 2017
November 17, 2017

The Disappeared

The statistics, the names, the stories continue to pile up, an almost “normalisation” of the crimes taking place—anyone, doing anything, might disappear. Until one day, until this time, it is one of our own.