logo
Sheikh Hasina's trial needs neutral observers, not partisan judges

Sheikh Hasina's trial needs neutral observers, not partisan judges

Indian Express5 hours ago
Within a month of filing charges, the Bangladesh International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) has already sentenced Sheikh Hasina to six months in jail. The actual sentencing looks prima facie valid, coming on a charge of contempt of court. The case against her is based on an audio in which she allegedly said, 'There are 227 cases against me, so I now have a licence to kill 227 people.' As Hasina has fled to India, the trial is happening in absentia, but she has a state-appointed defence counsel to represent her.
More than this particular instance, what deserves attention is the longer story of the ICT. The obvious point is that Hasina has gone from being the engineer of the ICT to a defendant in front of it. But this reversal cannot be dismissed as merely a poetic turn of justice.
There is a change in the social meaning of the prosecution of international crimes in Bangladesh. The ICT was set up not just to deliver justice, but also to consolidate a form of national mythology of the founding of Bangladesh. Such international tribunals tend to enforce the 'victor's justice', a term coined by Richard Minear, referring to the Tokyo war crimes tribunal set up by the Allied Powers.
Bangladesh's ICT follows this trend, and was widely criticised for its lack of due process. The faulty precedent is now being exploited by Hasina's opponents, whose victory has allowed them to implement an opposite version of justice and create an alternate national mythology.
In the same week when the charges of crimes against humanity were filed against Sheikh Hasina, there was another notable news which illustrated this turn. The Bangladesh Supreme Court had ordered the release of ATM Azharul Islam, a Jamaat-e-Islami leader. He was previously convicted by the same International Crimes Tribunal that will now hear the case against Hasina. Azharul Islam had been deemed responsible for a massacre which claimed more than a thousand lives during the 1971 war, but the Supreme Court overturned both the ICT's judgment and its own previous decision.
The ICT has been made to judge Hasina, taking a sharp U-turn from its intent of prosecuting Islamist opponents of Bangladesh's liberation war. The Law Adviser also attributed the release of Azharul Islam to the July uprising and painted him as an innocent victim of Hasina.
It is painful to compare atrocities. But Azharul was held responsible for the loss of a similar number of lives as Sheikh Hasina is being accused of. Azharul's crime, though, happened in a single village. The ease with which such a case was overturned points to one of two possibilities: Either the initial case against Islam was weak, or the inroads made by the Jamaat-e-Islami into the highest levels of the judiciary made it easy. Reality is likely to be a mixture of the two — a deeper perusal by a neutral observer familiar with court proceedings would reveal more.
In any case, the acquittal has solidified the legal foundation for what is known as 'accusation in a mirror'. This strategy is used by parties accused of grave crimes; they reaccuse and recriminate their opponents of similar crimes, often with little or no evidence, with the sole purpose of trivialising the crime itself. In psychology, the term DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender) refers to a similar manoeuvre.
Such a manoeuvre is not fully pre-planned. Over the past years, many of the opponents of Bangladesh's liberation war have used such tactics to try and trivialise the crimes related to it. One rather funny attempt to trivialise genocide was made by the present Ameer of Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh, Shafiqur Rahman, who suggested that holding elections without reforms would lead to an 'election genocide'.
In this perspective, the ICT's verdict against Hasina is a foregone conclusion. The immediate byproduct of this process is the loss of the special status of the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh's official history, and a gradual exoneration of the pro-Pakistan leaders of Jamaat-e-Islami and the BNP from their position as the worst criminals in Bangladesh's history. The longer-term result will be that there will be no fair mechanism to prosecute future crimes against humanity.
The prosecution of crimes against humanity has a short, flawed, but hopeful history. From the Nuremberg trials to the Tribunal set up over the Yugoslav wars, no process has been free of criticism. But the politicised use of the ICT, first by the Awami League to a lesser extent and now blatantly by a fluid group of anti-Awami League conspirators, marks a real disaster of this nascent field of legal theory.
As the journalist David Bergman — a longtime observer of the ICT's workings in Bangladesh — has suggested before, the ICT and its reputation can be saved by internationalising it. While national prosecution of international crimes is a great idea, it is severely limited by cultural and social factors when it is put into practice.
That judges and lawyers with little experience in prosecuting such cases have been appointed to the ICT is itself enough grounds to mistrust it. Only the presence of judges, lawyers and observers from other neutral countries, especially ones who specialise in international law and crimes against humanity, will make the process reliable and trustworthy.
The question is which political actor can prioritise due judicial process over the immediate demands of the political climate — there is none.
Mathew teaches politics and international relations at the School of Liberal Arts and Management Studies, P P Savani University, Surat. Ramachandran is a research scholar at the Department of Communication, University of Hyderabad
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Can Donald Trump force a ceasefire in Gaza?
Can Donald Trump force a ceasefire in Gaza?

Hindustan Times

time18 minutes ago

  • Hindustan Times

Can Donald Trump force a ceasefire in Gaza?

TWO WEEKS after Israel's dramatic war against Iran, Binyamin Netanyahu is arriving in Washington to bask in glory alongside Donald Trump. But to receive a victor's reception at the White House, Israel's prime minister may have to yield to America's president on another matter. As the two leaders meet on July 7th, Mr Trump is hoping to be able to announce an end to the war in Gaza. Thousands of kilometres from Washington, in Doha, negotiators for Israel and Hamas, the Islamist movement that began the war with its surprise attack and massacre 21 months ago, will be in feverish talks to seal a deal in time for Mr Netanyahu's visit to America. The parties have agreed in principle on the framework of an agreement. During an initial 60-day truce, half of the estimated 50 Israeli hostages still held in Gaza, 20 of whom are believed to be alive, will be released in exchange for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. During the same period there will be further talks aimed at a permanent ceasefire. But a number of important details are still in dispute. Hamas wants Israel to withdraw from most of the areas it currently holds in Gaza and to allow international organisations to distribute aid in the strip, rather than rely on the distribution hubs Israel has set up (hundreds of Palestinians have been killed trying to reach these hubs since they began operating in early June). The group also wants clear guarantees that the 60-day truce will indeed bring an end to the war. A similar ceasefire earlier this year collapsed when Israel resumed military operations and closed Gaza to aid deliveries after the first phase had ended. Mr Netanyahu has said the group's demands are 'unacceptable'. Before taking off for Washington he told reporters that he is determined that 'Hamas will not be [in Gaza]' once the war is over. Yet there are reasons to be optimistic that this round of talks will indeed end in a deal. Mr Trump, flush from the ceasefire he imposed on Israel and Iran after America's strikes on Iran's nuclear programme, likes the idea of himself as an unparalleled peacemaker. He has made it clear that he expects both sides to accept the deal, claiming he will be 'very firm' with Mr Netanyahu. Mr Netanyahu, for his part, wants Mr Trump's backing for more strikes if Iran tries to revive its nuclear and missile programmes, as Israeli intelligence fears it is trying to do. Mr Trump may not want to be dragged into another round of fighting with Iran, so Mr Netanyahu has more of an incentive to accept a deal in Gaza this time. At the same, the threat from his far-right coalition partners to leave the government should he decide to end the war is becoming less compelling. Israel will have to hold an election by October 2026 at the latest. For Mr Netanyahu, whose public image has been boosted by the strikes against Iran, an earlier one may not seem like a bad bet. Hamas, too, is under increasing pressure to compromise. With Iran drastically weakened, it has lost one of its main backers in the region. It still has the support of Qatar and Turkey, but both are anxious to remain in Mr Trump's good books and have made it clear to the Hamas leaders they expect them to play along. Within Gaza, Hamas has lost ground, both to Israel and to local gangs. A ceasefire now could be its best chance to retain some of its power. Yet even if a deal is reached this week, the reprieve is likely to be temporary. For the 60-day truce to lead to an end of the war, Mr Trump will have to keep up pressure on both sides. And the would-be peacemaker-in-chief is not known for his attention span.

Lashkar-e-Taiba enraged by Bilawal Bhutto's statement on extraditing Hafiz Saeed to India, his son says 'every Pakistani's head...'
Lashkar-e-Taiba enraged by Bilawal Bhutto's statement on extraditing Hafiz Saeed to India, his son says 'every Pakistani's head...'

India.com

time26 minutes ago

  • India.com

Lashkar-e-Taiba enraged by Bilawal Bhutto's statement on extraditing Hafiz Saeed to India, his son says 'every Pakistani's head...'

New Delhi: Bilawal Bhutto's statement of handing over Hafiz Saeed to India has been strongly opposed by the terrorist organization Lashkar-e-Taiba. Talha Saeed, son of India's most wanted terrorist Hafiz Saeed, opposed Bilawal's statement and said that Bilawal Bhutto is speaking the language of India and his statement has bowed the head of every Pakistani. In an interview given to a Qatari international channel, Bilawal Bhutto said that Pakistan can hand over Hafiz Saeed and Masood Azhar to India, but India should first show cooperation in talks and other matters. Bilawal Bhutto also said that Pakistan itself has got Hafiz Saeed punished for funding terrorism without India's help and today Hafiz Saeed is inside the jail. What did Hafiz Saeed's son say? Now, strong objection to Bilawal Bhutto's statement has come from the terrorist organization Lashkar-e-Taiba, whose chief Hafiz Saeed's son Talha Saeed criticized Bilawal's statement and said that all the terror cases against Hafiz Saeed in Pakistan are false and Bilawal should have presented Pakistan's side in the interview, and not opposed Hafiz Saeed by speaking India's language on the issue of Hafiz Saeed. Whatever Hafiz Saeed has done till date, he has done it for Pakistan only. Talha Saeed also announced a protest against Bilawal. What is Bilawal's position in Pakistan? Bilawal Bhutto's father Asif Ali Zardari is the current President of Pakistan and Bilawal Bhutto is the head of Pakistan People's Party (PPP), which is currently in alliance with the ruling Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's party Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) and is a partner in power in Pakistan. On May 28, Pakistan's Union Minister Malik Rashid had announced from an open platform that '24 crore Pakistanis are today represented by men like Hafiz Saeed and Saifullah Kasuri'. It is worth noting that former Pakistani army officials and many exiled human rights activists have given evidence of Pakistan's collusion with terrorists.

UK marks London 7/7 attacks as King Charles III hails 'spirit of unity'
UK marks London 7/7 attacks as King Charles III hails 'spirit of unity'

New Indian Express

timean hour ago

  • New Indian Express

UK marks London 7/7 attacks as King Charles III hails 'spirit of unity'

LONDON: The UK on Monday commemorated the 20th anniversary of the London July 7 bombings that killed 52 people, as King Charles III paid tribute to the spirit of unity shown after the atrocity. To mark the moment the first bomb went off Prime Minister Keir Starmer and London Mayor Sadiq Khan laid wreaths at the July 7 memorial in the capital's Hyde Park at 8:50 am (0750 GMT). On July 7, 2005, four homegrown Islamist extremists detonated suicide bombs on three underground trains and a bus across central London, killing dozens and injuring hundreds more. The city is holding events to mark the anniversary, with members of the royal family expected to join survivors, bereaved relatives and emergency services personnel at commemorations. The king urged people to draw on the "extraordinary courage and compassion" shown following the attack. "We remember with profound sadness the 52 innocent people who were killed in senseless acts of evil -- and the enduring grief of their loved ones," he said in a statement published by the domestic Press Association news agency. "In doing so, we should also remember the countless stories of extraordinary courage and compassion that emerged from the darkness of that day.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store