Bangladesh finds infamous ‘secret’ detention center at intelligence agency HQ

Ahammad Foyez
2024.10.03
Dhaka
Bangladesh finds infamous ‘secret’ detention center at intelligence agency HQ Family members of relatives who went missing during ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s rule, starting in 2009, gather in front of a police detective office waiting for news after she resigned and fled the country, in Dhaka, Aug. 7, 2024.
[Md. Hasan/BenarNews]

A new Bangladesh inquiry commission said Thursday it had found an infamous “secret” detention center at the military intelligence headquarters that people released from its 22 cells had chillingly talked about.

The detention center operated during the administrations of ousted ex-Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, and was run from the Dhaka headquarters of the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), which has no legal power to detain anyone, commission member Sazzad Hossain said.

 “We found similarities with the victims’ description during the [Sept. 25] visit,” Sazzad told a press conference in the Bangladeshi capital.

“Some changes were made, many pieces of evidence were destroyed and they had especially erased [prisoners’] writings on the wall by painting over them.”

The Commission on Enforced Disappearances was formed in August after Hasina resigned as PM and fled the country, to collect information and details surrounding incidents of enforced disappearance during her administrations, which had ruled Bangladesh uninterrupted since 2009. 

Some among the hundreds who had disappeared were freed from captivity after Hasina resigned on Aug. 5. They described how they had been held for very long periods in dark and dank cells, where thick walls kept out all sound.

Security officials nicknamed this center with its pitch-black cells as “Aynaghor,” which means House of Mirrors, said a Deutsche-Welle documentary that had alleged they existed. After that, it was known as “Aynaghor” in common parlance.

BD-TWO.jpg
Bangladesh interim government chief Muhammad Yunus (right) consoles Mayer Daak founder Hazera Khatun (center) as she holds a portrait of her son Sajedul Islam Sumon, who went missing during the tenure of ex-Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, in Dhaka, Aug. 13, 2024. [Indranil Mukherjee/AFP]

The mass movement that led Hasina to quit was seen as an indictment of her nearly 15 consecutive years as prime minister. During her time in power, she crushed dissent, had state institutions do her bidding, and stubborn critics of her rule vanished or were snatched away as presumed victims of enforced disappearances.

According to rights organization Odhikar, at least 708 people were victims of enforced disappearance between 2009 and June 2024.

For years, a range of domestic and international human rights groups, including organizations under the United Nations, had been raising deep concerns about allegations regarding enforced disappearances and the lack of judicial safeguards.

The commission on enforced disappearance, which was announced on Aug. 27 and operational since mid-September, lodged hundreds of enforced disappearance cases in a little under two weeks of its formation, said its president, Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury, who called the press conference on Thursday.

“We have received a total of 400 complaints in 13 working days between Sept. 15 and Oct. 2,” he said.

“We have already recorded statements of 75 people, including victims and victims’ families,” he said, referring also to some victims who had disappeared but returned.

BD-THREE.jpeg
Family members of relatives who they allege were forcibly disappeared during the successive governments of Sheikh Hasina, clamor to be let into a police detective center to get news about their missing loved ones after the PM resigned and fled the countr, in Dhaka, Aug. 7, 2024. [Md. Hasan/BenarNews]

Most of them said they had been picked up by the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s Detective Branch (DB) and Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC), Moyeneel said.

“All abductions were not enforced disappearances but all enforced disappearances were abductions,” he said.

Among the 75 people whose statements they recorded were an opposition politician and a suspended military general, who had been missing but returned.

“There are three types of victims. Those who returned after disappearing for days to years, some still missing and some sent to jail after several months of disappearance,” said another commission member, Nur Khan Liton, who is a human rights activist.

The commission did not say how many of the 400 complaints received were from victims who had returned.

“We are now getting some complaints from victims and their families who earlier did not make any contact with any rights group. So we think the number of enforced disappearance victims may be more,” than some rights organizations had gathered data on, he said.

The commission’s Oct. 10 deadline to submit its reports will likely be extended, the commission’s president said.

Additionally, he said the commission would recommend that the interim government amend the penal code, which has no provision for enforced disappearances.

When BenarNews contacted it with questions on Thursday about the now-empty detention center, the military’s Inter-Services Public Relations office declined comment.

POST A COMMENT

Add your comment by filling out the form below in plain text. Comments are approved by a moderator and can be edited in accordance with RFAs Terms of Use. Comments will not appear in real time. RFA is not responsible for the content of the postings. Please, be respectful of others' point of view and stick to the facts.