Advocate Chamber In Bangladesh

Does extra Judicial Killings diminish public faith on judicial system of Bangladesh? Do you agree with this statement? – Explain & Illustrate.

Introduction

An extrajudicial killing is the killing of a person by governmental authorities without the sanction of any judicial proceeding or legal process. Extrajudicial punishments are by their nature unlawful, since they bypass the due process of the legal jurisdiction in which they occur. Extrajudicial killings often target leading political, trade union, dissident, religious, and social figures and may be carried out by the state government or other state authorities like the armed forces and police. The Supreme Court of Bangladesh is the highest court of law in Bangladesh. It is composed of the High Court Division and the Appellate division, and was created by Part VI Chapter I of the Constitution of Bangladesh [1] adopted in 1972.

Since its inception, the RAB has seized a total of 3,149 illegal arms and more than 36,000 rounds of ammunition. It has also had many notable arrests. Although the RAB has been successful in apprehending several high-profile terrorists, including the infamous Bangla Bhai, Amnesty International has criticized the RAB’s lack of accountability as it has been responsible for numerous deaths which have been attributed to crossfire.[2] In March, 2010, the battalion leader stated that they have killed 622 due to ‘crossfire’, while some human rights organizations claim that over 1,000 extra-judicial killings are the product of the battalion. There have also been many reports of torture.

Footnotes:

[1] Constitution of Bangladesh: Rapid Action Battalion or RAB is an elite anti-crime and anti-terrorism unit of Bangladesh Police constituted amending the Armed Police Battalion Ordinance, 1979. Under the command of Inspector General of Police (IGP) it consists of members of Bangladesh Police, Bangladesh Army, Bangladesh Navy, Bangladesh Air Force, Border Guards Bangladesh and Bangladesh Ansar. It was formed on 26 March 2004 and started its operations from 14 April 2004. Additional Inspector General of Police Anwarul Iqbal is the founding Director General of this elite unit.

[2] Crossfire and Death Squad: The crossfire and the death squad is an armed military, police, insurgent, or terrorist squad that conducts extra-judicial killings, assassinations, and forced disappearances of persons as part of a war, insurgency or terror campaign. These killings are often conducted in ways meant to ensure the secrecy of the killers’ identities, so as to avoid accountability.

When we are in a society, or in a state, we are entitled to your fundamental human rights. I am against the practice by which people like that are arrested, taken to a government security formation and executed. I am insisting that all the police or soldiers involved in the extrajudicial killing should be identified and made to face the law. They are entitled to be prosecuted and jailed or even sentenced to death. People must be arrested and tried in the proper court of law and be sentenced to what terms their crimes require. The law does not allow for any extrajudicial killing of anybody whether he is alleged to have killed thousands of people or not. That is the argument we are making.
According to the extra judiciary punishment from An Encyclopedia Wikipedia [3] , “Extrajudicial punishment is often a feature of politically repressive regimes, but even self-proclaimed or internationally recognized democracies have been known to use extrajudicial punishment under certain circumstances. Although the legal use of capital punishment is generally decreasing around the world, individuals or groups deemed threatening—or even simply “undesirable”—to a government may nevertheless be targeted for punishment by a regime or its representatives. Such actions typically happen quickly, with security forces acting on a covert basis, performed in such a way as to avoid a massive public outcry and/or international criticism that would reflect badly on the state. Another possibility is for uniformed security forces to punish a victim, but under circumstances that make it appear as self-defense or suicide. The former can be accomplished by planting recently-fired weapons near the body, the latter by fabricating evidence suggesting suicide. In such cases, it can be difficult to prove that the perpetrators acted wrongly. Because of the dangers inherent in armed confrontation, even police or soldiers who might strongly prefer to take an enemy alive may still kill to protect themselves or civilians, and potentially cross the line into extrajudicial murder. Extrajudicial punishment may be planned and carried out by a particular branch of a state, without informing other branches, or even without having been ordered to commit such acts.

Footnotes:

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extrajudicial_punishment — According to the URL page (retrieved on 11.02.2011)

I am opposed to anybody killing other people in the name of religious fanaticism but we shouldn’t establish a situation in which people are beginning to feel that anybody believed to be at sectarian excesses should be rounded up and shot. Besides, we need to know why this type of incident has become a recurrent decimal in our national life. If we allow extrajudicial killings to continue, anybody can be labeled specified and will be killed in our country Bangladesh.
Why is the criminals killed by extra judicially? Is it because we want to shut criminals up so that we don’t know the people behind the group? Who is financing the killers? Where are the criminals getting their ammunition from? Is it not even possible that he got his ammunition from the Police? Why did they shoot the criminal?

Human rights are “rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled.”[4] Proponents of the concept usually assert that everyone is endowed with certain entitlements merely by reason of being human rights are thus conceived in an universalist and egalitarian fashion. Such entitlements can exist as shared norms of actual human moralities, as justified moral norms or natural rights supported by strong reasons, or as legal rights either at a national level or within international law.[5] However, there is no consensus as to the precise nature of what in particular should or should not be regarded as a human right in any of the preceding senses, and the abstract concept of human rights has been a subject of intense philosophical debate and criticism.

Footnotes:

[4] Human Rights: The human rights movement emerged in the 1970s, especially from former socialists in eastern and Western Europe, with major contributions also from the United States and Latin America. The movement quickly jelled as social activism and political rhetoric in many nations put it high on the world agenda. By the 21st century, Moyn has argued, the human rights movement expanded beyond its original anti-totalitarianism to include numerous cases involving humanitarianism and social and economic development in the Third World.

[5] International Law: Many of the basic ideas that animated the movement developed in the aftermath of the Second World War, culminating in its adoption by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948. While the phrase “human rights” is relatively modern the intellectual foundations of the modern concept can be traced through the history of philosophy and the concepts of natural law rights and liberties as far back as the city states of Classical Greece and the development of Roman law. The true forerunner of human rights discourse was the enlightenment concept of natural rights developed by figures such as John Locke and Immanuel Kant and through the political realm in the United States Bill of Rigs and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.

Conclusion

I am totally agreed with the statement that “Extra-Judicial Killings diminish public faith on judicial system of Bangladesh”. So in conclusion I would probably summing up my point of view and say that we shouldn’t establish a situation in which people are beginning to feel that anybody believed to be at sectarian excesses should be rounded up and shot. Besides, we need to know why this type of incident has become a recurrent decimal in our national life.

If we allow extrajudicial killings to continue, anybody can be labeled specified and will be killed in our country Bangladesh. Sometimes we fear that someone may win a case against you does not suggest killing without trial. My suggestion is to take the person to court. If he wins at a lower court, take him to a higher one and so on up to the Supreme Court. We must face it. How come the man got up to what he was alleged to have done? What has happened is evidence that governance has failed. It shows the revolution that is to come. That’s the only way to find answers to the various problems that confront us. The way of the extra-judiciary killing is you don’t arrest somebody, bring that person to your custody and then tell the public that he is dead. The soldiers that arrested the man said they handed him over to the Police while he was still alive. This man was a menace to the society, but it would be that he was unguarded. It is wrong for the police or the RAB to take him to their custody and summarily execute him. After all, we should not forget that all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

——————————————————-

Bibliography and References

  • El Salvador’s Decade of Terror, Americas Watch, Human Rights Watch Books, Yale University Press,1991,21
  • Donald Rayfield, Stalin and his Hangmen: The Tyrant and Those Who Killed for Him, Random House, 2004. Pages 362–363.

———————————————————–

Correspondence

For: The Lawyers & Jurists

M.L.Hotel Tower Ltd,208,Shahid Syed Nazrul Islam Sarani,

Bijoy Nagar, Dhaka-1000.

Email-admin@lawyersnjurists.com/nomaer@hotmail.com

www.lawyersnjurists.com

Country code+ Ph No.

Ph:0088-02-9571389; 0088-02-9513408,

0088-02-9564329, 0088-02-9564398

Direct cell with country code:

Local Code :

a)0088-01733689444

b)0088-01674647033

C)0088-01552632768

Disclaimer:

The information contains in this web-site is prepared for educational purpose. This site may be used by the students, faculties, independent learners and the learned advocates of all over the world. Researchers all over the world have the access to upload their writes up in this site. In consideration of the people’s participation in the Web Page, the individual, group, organization, business, spectator, or other, does hereby release and forever discharge the Lawyers & Jurists, and its officers, board, and employees, jointly and severally from any and all actions, causes of actions, claims and demands for, upon or by reason of any damage, loss or injury, which hereafter may be sustained by participating their work in the Web Page. This release extends and applies to, and also covers and includes, all unknown, unforeseen, unanticipated and unsuspected injuries, damages, loss and liability and the consequences thereof, as well as those now disclosed and known to exist.  The provisions of any state’s law providing substance that releases shall not extend to claims, demands, injuries, or damages which are known or unsuspected to exist at this time, to the person executing such release, are hereby expressly waived. However the Lawyers & Jurists makes no warranty expressed or implied or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product or process disclosed or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product process or service by trade name, trade mark, manufacturer or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation or favouring by the Lawyers & Jurists. The views and opinions of the authors expressed in the Web site do not necessarily state or reflect those of the Lawyers & Jurists. Above all, if there is any complaint drop by any independent user to the admin for any contents of this site, the Lawyers & Jurists would remove this immediately from its site.