A complaint has been filed at the International Criminal Court against three officers of the Bangladesh Army, who led the massacre against unarmed people in Gopalganj on Wednesday and the subsequent crackdown in the name of curfew.
The officers are the General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the 55th Infantry Division and Jessore Cantonment, Major General JM Emdadul Islam; the Brigade Commander, Brigadier General Md Mizanur Rahman; and Field Officer Lt Col ZM Mabruk.
The other accused are the chief adviser of the unconstitutional interim government and Jamaat puppet, Prof Muhammad Yunus; army chief General Waker-Uz-Zaman; Home Adviser Lt Gen (Retd) Jahangir Alam Chowdhury; and leaders of Yunusโ National Citizen Party (NCP), including its convener, Nahid Islam.
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Expatriate Awami League leader Nadim Bhuiyan filed the complaint last week, according to barrister and solicitor Nijhoom Majumder. The ICC gave him a copy of the acknowledgement.
Since no Bangladeshi court would try the matter, Nadim Bhuiyan charged the perpetrators under Article 15 of the Rome Statute.
โThe crimes committed by the Bangladesh Army are more barbaric than what I saw the Pakistan Army doing in 1971. I could not grasp such heinous crimes,โ he told journalists.
Another complaint was filed the same day by Texas-based Awami League leader Nahida Naser in line with Article 15 of the Rome Statute against 64 persons, including Yunus.
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She filed the complaint at the ICC seeking justice for three types of crimes against humanityโmurder of police, Awami League members, and minoritiesโcommitted during August 5-8 last year when the jihadists and terrorists captured power through conspiracy.
The unconstitutional interim government indemnified the crimes in an order on October 14.
Talking to journalists, Nahida Naser said the current state of affairs in Bangladesh cannot be accepted. The illegal government is obstructing freedom of speech.
They overthrew a democratically elected government and oppressed the minorities, killed the police, and also defamed the freedom fighters. โThis cannot continue in my country.
โI have filed this complaint against Yunus and his collaborators,โ she said, urging all to raise their voices and file complaints in the ICC.
Earlier, Sylhet City Corporation Mayor Anwaruzzaman Chowdhury filed a complaint at the ICC on November 8 last year against 62 people over the same allegations.
The accused include Prof Yunus, Jahangir, advisers Prof Asif Nazrul, Brigadier (Retd) M Sakhawat Hossain, Syeda Rizwana Hasan, and Asif Mahmud Sajeeb Bhuiyan, and former adviser Nahid Islam.
Later, on June 22, Toronto-based expatriate Md Hassan filed another complaint at the ICC over the same charges.
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