Journalists are being killed, tortured and mobbed one after another while performing their professional duties or due to hostility arising from professional work. There are also allegations of including their names in politically motivated murder cases.
What is the reason for so much anger or resentment towards journalists?
Analysts say that the government has failed to fulfil the expectations that were placed on it. There is a situation of widespread concern regarding media freedom and the security of journalists.
On August 7, Md Asaduzzaman Tuhin, a staff reporter for the daily Protidiner Kagoj, went live on Facebook about extortion from sidewalks and shops in the Chandana Chowrasta area in Gazipur. After two hours, he shared a video of the Chowrasta area criticising the lack of traffic rule enforcement.
Within 30 minutes, five to six criminals wielding cleavers and other sharp weapons attacked him in the Chandana Chowrasta area. At that time, he ran and took shelter in a tea shop in Eidgaon Market. But the miscreants entered the tea shop and started hacking him indiscriminately, leaving him dead on the spot.
On September 4, police recovered the body of a journalist hanging from a tree in the Shaibal Point area of โโCox’s Bazar beach. It was later learned that the deceased was journalist Amin Ullah. He was working as the Ukhiya Upazila correspondent of the national daily Amar Pran Bangladesh Patrika.
Locals said that Amin worked in the Rohingya camp. He also wrote and was active on Facebook about contemporary issues, including Yaba peddling.
In a video that went viral on social media in the evening, Amin was seen blaming the then officer-in-charge (OC) of Ukhiya police station, Md. Arif Hossain, for harassing him and his family and provoking suicide. He also sought the intervention of the Chief Adviser, the Army and the RAB.
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Another incident took place in a courtroom in Dhaka on September 4. Journalists on duty at the bail hearing of senior journalist Monjurul Alam Panna were attacked by lawyers. Other journalists present said that when journalist Muktadir Rashid Romeo tried to talk to Panna in the courtroom, BNP-backed lawyer Mohiuddin Mahi threatened him to leave.
At that time, Muktadir said: “Only the judge has the power to throw him out of the courtroom. If he says so, I will leave. Let him speak.” Upon hearing this, the lawyer became arrogant and beat Muktadir. Journalist Asif Mohammad Siam, who was standing next to him, tried to stop him. Then, journalist Siam of Somoy TV was injured in the attack by the lawyers.
Dhaka Reporters Unity (DRU) has strongly condemned and protested the attacks and harassment of journalists by some lawyers in the courtroom while performing their professional duties.
On Friday, DRU Executive Committee President Abu Saleh Akon and General Secretary Mainul Hasan Sohel condemned and protested the attack on DRU Member Muktadir and journalist Siam, and at the same time, called for identifying the culprits by looking at the video footage and taking punitive action.
DRU leaders said that the incidents of attacks on journalists while performing their professional duties are increasing day by day. This incident is a threat to independent journalism.
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โThere have been attacks on journalists in the courtroom before. If those attacks had been prosecuted, such incidents would not have happened again. Law enforcement agencies need to be more sincere to prevent attacks and ensure punishment of the attackers,โ the statement said.
State-sponsored intimidation
On August 28, Panna was arrested in Dhaka alongside prominent figures, including a former minister and 1971 Liberation War veteran Abdul Latif Siddiqui, Dhaka University professor Sheikh Hafizur Rahman Curzon, and several other war veterans and intellectuals for attending a peaceful discussion event on Bangladesh’s 1971 Liberation War, the Constitution at the DRU auditorium. The organisers, Moncho-71, secured police permission to hold the event. However, soon after the discussion began, a mob of 20-30 people stormed the room and assaulted the guests, journalists and attendees. Around 18 of them were injured in the mob attack that lasted for an hour before the police appeared on the scene and took 16 of the injured to the Detective Branch of Police Headquarters for โsafety.โ After 12 hours, police filed a case against the individuals under the draconian Anti-Terrorism Act, and the next morning, a Dhaka court ordered them jailed, rejecting their bail petitions.
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The case statement exposes the policeโs ill intention as it falsely claims that Abdul Latif Siddiqui was giving a speech as part of a conspiracy to destabilise the country through armed struggle and overthrow the current interim government by inciting others. In reality, the accused did not speak at the event at all, while Panna was just a listener.
According to a human rights report by the human rights organisation Mandhaka Sanskriti Foundation (MSF), 96 journalists were subjected to various forms of attacks, legal harassment, threats, killings and torture in 33 incidents in different districts of the country in August while performing their professional duties. The number of journalists attacked in August was almost three times that of July.
Amid a targeted persecution of journalists, at least four journalists died in the last month. Of them, one was brutally killed by criminals in Gazipur, two were found dead in rivers, while the latest incident shows a journalistโs body hanging from a tree in Coxโs Bazar.
On August 31, police recovered the body of journalist Wahid Uz-Zaman Bulu from the basement of the Rupsha Bridge in Khulna, with injury marks on the right hand and face. Wahed was a senior staff reporter of the Sangbad Pratidin. He was a member of the Khulna Press Club and the Khulna Union of Journalists (KUJ).
On August 22, the body of freedom fighter and senior journalist Bibhuranjan Sarker from the Meghna River in Munshiganj. On the same day, BDNEWS published an open letter by the late journalist, in which some of the comments are being considered as serious allegations of creating โpressureโ and โanxietyโ directly from the interim government.
According to information received so far, in the past 13 months, more than 300 journalists have been accused in various harassment cases, including murder cases, and 40 journalists have been arrested. More than 300 journalists have been banned from travelling abroad. Bank accounts of more than 100 journalists have been frozen. Cases of harassment and corruption have been filed with the Anti-Corruption Commission.
Unprecedented incidents have occurred in Bangladesh, including the dismissal of more than a thousand journalists from all over the country, the cancellation of press accreditation cards of 168 journalists, the suspension, cancellation and expulsion of memberships of more than 100 journalists from press clubs across the country, including the National Press Club, and media capture. Many journalists have been forced to leave the country since August 5 last year due to insecurity.
While mob violence is taking place every day, most of the advisers of the Yunus-led government, as well as the Kingโs party leaders, are advocating for more attacks by trivialising the crime.
Information and Broadcasting Adviser and former Islami Chhatra Shibir member Mahfuj Alam recently said that the revolutionary students and people of July-August are not a mob.
His comments came following a statement by the chief adviserโs press secretary and former AFP bureau chief, Shafiqul Alam, who said that the mobs should be identified as โpressure groups.โ
Pro-Yunus activists concerned too
When asked why journalists are facing such harassment and anger while doing their professional work, human rights activist and researcher Rezaur Rahman Lenin told Bangla Tribune: โBefore the interim government came to power, journalists were subjected to widespread cases and attacks during Sheikh Hasinaโs tenure. Information says that around 500 journalists were subjected to attacks and cases during the last period of Sheikh Hasina. Meanwhile, information says that this year at least 126 journalists have been subjected to attacks and cases, and among them, one female journalist was gang raped. There have also been reports in the press that there was gang-rape, beatings while gathering news, exposing corruption, harassment of journalists for speaking out against terrorism and extortion were in no way desirable. The expectations that were on the government have failed to be fulfilled. There is a situation of great concern regarding media freedom and the security of journalists.โ
He said that the important thing that needs to be done in this situation is to work on implementing the recommendations of the Journalists Reform Commission.
The kind of false and harassing cases in which journalists are being detained, whose rights are being violated within the legal framework, needs to be stopped immediately. Attention should be paid to ensure that journalists or the media are not subjected to mobs in any way. The sooner this is stopped, the more the stateโs fear of establishing human rights and the rule of law in Bangladesh will be strengthened, he said.
Another rights activist, Nur Khan, said: โJournalism is a reflection of society. To understand society, you have to understand journalism and news. This is bound to happen in the current unrest. Mob violence, deterioration of law and order, all have created instability.โ
He said: โPeople employed in different professions are heroes in their own fields. We do not show tolerance in our own places. That aspect also needs to be taken into consideration. This is not only the case of journalists, but of all professionals.โ
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