DHAKA, (AFP) - Bangladesh's feared Rapid Action Battalion police kill about 100 "criminals" a year, but when they shot 16-year-old Limon Hossain they discovered that their impunity might have limits.
Hossain, a student who has become a symbol for anger over tactics commonly used by elite "RAB" officers, was hit at point-blank range and survived only after his leg was amputated.
The RAB says he was a member of a criminal "terrorist" gang and was wounded in a gunfight with RAB commandos, but government-backed agencies, rights groups and even -- it seems -- the prime minister have all questioned its account.
Hossain's case has unleashed an outpouring of criticism of the RAB, which can normally rely on public support for its routine killing of alleged criminals in what it describes as "encounters" or "incident shootings".
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| Sixteen-year-old Bangladeshi student Limon Hossain (C) pictured with relatives at a hospital in Dhaka, after being shot by Bangladesh's Rapid Action Battalion. |
"I was walking home when one officer grabbed my shirt collar," Hossain told AFP, recalling the daytime attack in March near his village of Jhalakati in southwest Bangladesh. "He said I was a terrorist. I told him I wasn't, I told him I was just an ordinary student but he didn't listen -- he shot me through the leg.
"He hadn't asked me any questions, not even my name. I was lying there thinking this was it, it was the last day of my life," he said from his hospital bed in Dhaka.
Hossain survived but, because he was left to bleed on the ground for hours, doctors had to amputate his right leg above the knee four days after the shooting. He is now learning to walk again with a prosthetic leg.
"This case is a milestone," said Nur Khan Liton of the local rights group ASK. "Before, the public thought extrajudicial killings were justified as it was only criminals targeted. Now people realise that RAB kill normal people too." No RAB officer has ever been prosecuted or held to account for any extrajudicial killing, according to the New York-based Human Rights Watch, which says RAB is a "death squad" that acts as "judge, jury and executioner".
In the most recent high-profile example, five alleged criminals were shot dead in the Uttara district of the capital Dhaka in August by the RAB, in circumstances that remain unclear.
After any fatal incident, the RAB issues standardised press releases, which many local papers run in full without further comment, saying the victim was involved in criminal activity and was killed by crossfire or in a "shoot-out".
Immediately after Hossain's shooting, RAB filed charges against the teenager -- the first step towards a prosecution -- claiming he was part of a criminal gang run by Morshed Jommader, who was the original target of the RAB operation.
"I say very strongly, that he (Hossain) is a member of this Morshed group," Commander Mohammad Sohail, head of RAB's legal and media wing, told AFP. "(This claim) that we have shot him intentionally in public, in daylight... pointing the gun in his leg, this is absolutely fake," he said.
Hossain was hit during a shoot-out between RAB members and Morshed's gang, Sohail said, accusing those who challenged the RAB's account of having "ill motives".
But for the first time since it was founded in 2004, the RAB's behaviour has been called into question by senior establishment bodies.
"RAB felt they must establish that he was a terrorist so that they could not be criticised. They came up with this accusation that he was the member of a gang," said Mizanur Rahman, chairman of the government-appointed National Human Rights Commission.
The fact that the criminal charges were filed against Hossain only after he was shot raises doubts over their legitimacy, he said. "This must be taken as a test case. RAB have done good counter-terrorism work but this doesn't mean all the bad can be overlooked. They have to follow the law. They can't just shoot a person," Rahman added.
According to an independent ASK investigation, RAB's claim that there was a firefight is untrue. "Everyone we interviewed said they'd heard only one shot," ASK's Liton said.
A government inquiry also concluded that there was no evidence either Hossain or his family were involved in criminal activity.
Even Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina appeared to come out in Hossain's support by admitting there was no proof he was a criminal, but the story, citing anonymous officials in her private office, was deleted from local news agency BSS's website after two hours.
The case filed against Hossain "is a concocted case without legal foundation," his lawyer Idrisur Rahman said.
Hossain's mother has filed a complaint against the RAB, but the family are pinning their hopes on an intervention by the prime minister.
"I feel very bad losing my leg but now I am more scared about the false cases against me. I don't want people to think I am a terrorist associate," he said.
"People are threatening me, telling me to stop saying RAB shot me -- they say I'll lose my other leg if I don't shut up." |
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