The interim authorities of Bangladesh on Saturday introduced that it could ban all actions of the Awami League, the political occasion of the nation’s ousted chief Sheikh Hasina, below the nation’s antiterrorism act till a number of authorized instances towards the occasion and its leaders have concluded.
The federal government, led by the Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, additionally amended a regulation to make sure that a whole occasion could be tried for sure crimes, not simply particular person members.
Final summer season, Ms. Hasina’s authoritarian authorities was toppled by a pupil protest motion. She fled to India, however the Awami League maintained a presence in Bangladesh.
When Hasnat Abdullah, one of many leaders of final 12 months’s rebellion, was attacked final week, supporters of Ms. Hasina’s occasion had been blamed. That prompted extra pupil outrage and calls for for harder motion towards the Awami League.
“Our final objective is to see that the Awami League is banned,” Mr. Hasnat mentioned throughout a protest on Saturday. “Even when I make no additional bulletins, don’t go away the streets till the Awami League is banned.”
A whole bunch of individuals, together with college students in wheelchairs or on crutches who had been injured throughout protests final 12 months, joined the rally and demanded that the Awami League be banned. Different political events, together with the coed wing of Jamaat-e-Islami, Islami Andolan, and members of Hefazat-e-Islam, a nonpolitical Islamic strain group, additionally joined the demonstration.
On Saturday night, the regulation minister, Asif Nazrul, mentioned the federal government would ban “all actions” of the Awami League below Bangladesh’s Anti-Terrorism Act “till the trials of the occasion and its leaders on the Worldwide Crimes Tribunal are accomplished.”
The tribunal, regardless of its title, is a home court docket, and can finally rule on accusations that Awami League members dedicated atrocities through the 2024 protests. The interim authorities says that the authorized modification was to make sure that a political occasion shouldn’t be capable of disown a person member as a foul actor whereas persevering with to again unhealthy conduct.
An inquiry fee fashioned by the interim authorities said in December that Ms. Hasina orchestrated mass disappearances throughout her 15 years in energy.
Individually, a United Nations fact-finding committee mentioned in February that at the very least 1,400 folks, together with youngsters, had been killed by regulation enforcement and members of Ms. Hasina’s occasion throughout final 12 months’s protests.
In a Fb publish, the Awami League alluded to the unelected nature of the interim authorities in a touch upon the modification: “Choices of an illegitimate authorities are additionally illegitimate themselves.”
In 2024, pupil protests towards a job reservation system grew into an enormous rebellion fueled by frustration and anger at Ms. Hasina’s rule. Tensions escalated after the demise of a protester in mid-July, which led her administration to dam the web, impose curfews and order military, paramilitary and police forces to crack down on the protesters.
Ms. Hasina fled Bangladesh on Aug. 5, narrowly escaping the 1000’s of protesters marching towards her residence. Three days later, Mr. Yunus took an oath as the brand new head of the federal government.
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