NEW DELHI: Former Bangladesh premier Sheikh Hasina has accused interim government chief Muhammad Yunus of perpetrating “genocide” and failing to protect Hindus and other minorities in her first public address after stepping down in August and fleeing the country.
Hasina, who took shelter in India after being forced out of office by widespread protests led by student groups, made the remarks in a virtual address to supporters of her Awami League party. The speech was part of an event held in New York on Sunday to mark “Bijoy Dibos” or Victory Day, observed on December 16 to commemorate the defeat of Pakistani forces in Bangladesh’s liberation war of 1971.
The former premier has had a long-running feud with Nobel laureate Yunus, and accused the head of Bangladesh’s caretaker government of being the “main perpetrator of genocide” and “power-hungry”. She reiterated her earlier allegations of Yunus being involved in corruption and money laundering in the operations of Grameen Bank, the development bank he founded to launch microfinance schemes.
Though Hasina has issued a handful of statements either through her US-based son Sajeeb Wazed or through the Awami League’s social media accounts, this was her first public address on recent developments in Bangladesh.
Awami League leaders told HT there are plans for Hasina to virtually address another gathering of party supporters in London on December 8.
Hasina, who spoke in Bengali for almost an hour, claimed there were plans to assassinate her and her sister Sheikh Rehana just like their father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was killed by army officers in 1975.
“The armed protestors were directed towards Ganabhaban. If the security guards opened fire, many lives would have been lost. It was a matter of 25-30 minutes, and I was forced to leave. I told them [guards] not to fire no matter what happened,” she said, referring to the chaos that preceded her flight from Dhaka on August 5.
“Today, I am being accused of genocide. In reality, Yunus has been involved in genocide in a meticulously designed manner. The masterminds – the student coordinators and Yunus – are behind this genocide,” she said.
Hasina alleged that police personnel, members of minority communities and Awami League leaders were killed during the protests, and “mosques, shrines, dargahs, churches and Buddhist places of worship” were attacked.
“Hindus, Buddhists, Christians – no one has been spared. Eleven churches have been razed, temples and Buddhist shrines have been broken. When the Hindus protested, the Iskcon leader was arrested,” she said, in an apparent reference to the recent arrest of Bangladeshi monk Chinmoy Krishna Das on sedition charges.
“What is this persecution of minorities for? Why are they being ruthlessly persecuted and attacked?” she said. “People no longer have the right to justice…I never even got the time to resign.”
There was no immediate word from Indian officials on Hasina’s remarks. Yunus’s spokesperson Shafiqul Alam told the media in Dhaka that Hasina was a “mass murderer” and the interim government was “shocked and surprised” by her remarks.
“Sheikh Hasina is a mass murderer. She has overseen one of the most brutal dictatorships. Under her watch, thousands of people were killed [and] disappeared. Millions of opposition activists were charged with fake cases and now she is talking…,” he said.
“We are quite shocked and surprised that she is still allowed to talk to the media from her residence,” Alam said.
India-Bangladesh ties have hit a new low in recent weeks over the persecution of Hindus and the arrest of Das, which have triggered protests by Hindu groups in several states bordering the neighbouring country. Bangladesh’s foreign ministry summoned the Indian envoy on Tuesday to protest the storming of the country’s consulate in Agartala by a group of protestors. Yunus and other leaders of the caretaker administration have sought to up the ante by saying Bangladesh can seek the extradition of Hasina.