Editorial
Home Minister's explanation of 'crossfire' killings untenable
The nation demands an end to extra-judicial deaths
We are indeed shocked by Home Minister Sahara Khatun's assertion that there have been no 'crossfire' killings under the present government. The shock takes an even more acute form when she describes all the killings that have gone on as acts of self-defence on the part of the security forces. We would like to point out here, in the clearest and most unambiguous manner, that in the past many years these deaths from so-called crossfires have given the country a bad name. What now makes these deaths extremely regrettable is the fact that the Awami League, before it rode to power at the general elections a year ago, had strongly made clear its opposition to 'crossfire' deaths and had indeed pledged to put an end to them.
Obviously, there has been a backsliding on the issue. More pertinently, it appears that the government has been speaking in different voices on the subject. Not long ago, the shipping minister surprised all of us when he asserted that 'crossfire' killings would help restore law and order. Then Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina stepped in, through informing a foreign delegation calling on her that her government was opposed to all extra-judicial deaths. And now comes this fresh new comment from none other than the home minister. Let us be very specific here: Sahara Khatun's defence of 'crossfire' deaths as deaths occurring in self-defence on the part of the security forces is untenable for two reasons. In the first place, only because an individual in high authority says there have been no 'crossfire' deaths is no cause to accept it as the unfettered truth. In the second, all these deaths have mostly occurred after the law enforcers reportedly accompanied the victims, moments before their deaths, to various places in search of their accomplices who, it has regularly been said, opened fire on the security forces. The forces fired back and in all that 'crossfire' the arrestees lost their lives. Intriguingly, not one among the accomplices was nabbed or killed and neither was any bodily injury caused to any member of the security forces. No government, not this one, not the caretaker administration, not the BNP-led one before that, has ever been able to explain away this gap in information.
We are afraid the home minister's defence of 'crossfire' killings can now only embolden those who have been indulging in such extra-judicial murder and thereby open new avenues for them to justify such killings. One may point out here that around the world suspected criminals are regularly nabbed by the law enforcing agencies, but how many instances are there of arrested individuals dying in police custody or of security personnel firing back at shadowy or non-existent criminal elements in self-defence?
All that the nation wants is an immediate end to such killings. Unless reassurances followed by concrete action on such an issue of grave public concern come from the government, there is the danger of the law and human rights becoming casualties in a country whose people happen to be struggling for the creation of a viable democratic society. The rule of law must prevail, due process of law fully observed. There can be no alternative to civilised behaviour.
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