Family members of forced disappearance people on Friday urged the government to inform the whereabouts of their kin immediately.
“The country has become free now. But my son Abdul Quader Masum has not returned home yet,” Ayesha Ali, mother of the victim said while addressing a human chain programme at the Central Shaheed Minar in the capital.
Mayer Dak, a platform of the families of the people who fell victim to forced disappearance, organised the programme marking International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances.
Bangladesh observed the day at a time when various quarters, after the fall of Sheikh Hasina led government, are demanding trial of those responsible for enforced disappearance of people.
Politicians, rights activists, jurists and family members of victims took part in the programme.
The kin of the victims urge the government to return back the disappeared people to their families.
Sanjida Islam, coordinator of the platform, said that Sheikh Hasina fled the country on August 5.
“But the rest of the evil forces are still in the country. But the people, who have been disappeared, have not returned to their families yet,” she said.
Addressing the programme, 13-year old Lamia said her father was a victim of the forced disappearance on December 4 in 2013.
“I was only two years then. I haven’t got the filial affection of my father. I want to touch my father and I want to feel how father’s love is. My lone demand is let my father be brought to me,” she said in an emotion-choked voice.
Like Lamia, kin of other forcibly disappeared people also urged the government to bring back their relatives. Anika Islam Esha said her father had been kept out from her.
“Every day, my younger dreams that our father will come back. He often asks why our father is not coming. We are helpless by losing our father. We want back our father,” she said, adding that they want to know what actually happened to her father.
Victims’ families alleged that individuals who expressed difference of opinions were disappeared. After returning back, many of the forcibly disappeared people claimed that they were kept imprisoned in Ayna Ghar, a secret prison run by the DGFI.
The interim government on Tuesday formed a five-member Commission to look into the incidents of forced disappearance committed by the law enforcement agencies during the last 15 years.
Thanking the government for the initiative, Nagarik Oikya president Mahmudur Rahman Manna said the kin of the forced disappeared people think that they would get back their near and dear ones after the victory achieved through the fall of Sheikh Hasina led government.
“But, the truth is that many of the forced disappeared people would not return. The kin of those victims will have to bear the pain for life,” he said.
Addressing the programme, Barrister Sara Hossain said that the higher court kept mum on the issue.
“The court has kept silent. We have not seen any interference of the court in this regard,” she said.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk has warmly welcomed the announcement of Bangladesh's accession to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance."The issue of enforced disappearances has a long and painful history in Bangladesh, on which the UN Human Rights Office and UN human rights mechanisms have advocated robustly," said spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Ravina Shamdasani in a statement on Friday.
The International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance was adopted in New York on 20 December in 2006.
