Staff Reporter :Secretary General of BNP Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Wednesday accused the government of nurturing ‘state terrorism’ in the country to eliminate the ‘opposition. “There is no democracy, no human rights and no rule of law in the country. Bangladesh has virtually become a fascist country now,” he said. Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said this at a financial assistance distribution programme held in the Sagar-Runi Auditorium of Dhaka Reporters’ Unity. Jatiyatabadi Help Cell, a volunteer organisation, organised the programme and provided financial assistance to the family members of five Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal (JCD) leaders who disappeared during the party’s anti-government movement. The disappeared leaders are: Sutrapur Thana President Selim Reza Pintu, Dhaka City Ward No 71 unit Vice-President Md Chanchal, Barisal City Ward No 20 unit President Firoz Khan Kalu, Laxichap Union of Nilphamari district unit General Secretary Golam Rabbani and Bangla College JCD leader Md Akram. Vice-Chairman of BNP Md Shahjahan, Joint-Secretary General Khairul Kabir Khokon, Law Affairs Secretary Kaysar Kamal, Assistant Organising Secretary Shamsuzzaman Khan, Assistant Office Secretary Taiful Islam Tipu, Assistant Information and Research Secretary Kader Gani Chowdhury and JCD President Rajib Ahsan spoke at the programme, among others. Engineer Belal Hossain presided over the programme, while JCD Deputy-Information and Research Secretary Mamun Khan moderated it. Mentioning that the incidents of enforced disappearance began in the country in 2010, Mirza Fakhrul said, it is a crime against humanity.The BNP leader claimed that more than 1,000 leaders and activists were killed and about 500 disappeared, 1,000 were maimed and thousands of people sent to jail in the last seven years.Besides, he said, their leaders and activists are being tortured, attacked and even their land and businesses are being grabbed to establish a one-party rule destroying pluralism.”It is unfortunate that the whole country has now become subservient to a particular party as all the institutions have been politicised,” the BNP secretary general observed.To overcome it, he said, there is no second option than waging a popular united movement for the sake of democracy and people’s voting and human rights.Turning to militancy, he said the government has turned down BNP’s call for forging a national unity against militancy as it is trying to use the issue to make its political gain. “We’ve long been saying it won’t be possible to eliminate extremism if the government uses it for its political gain.”Criticising the government for killing the suspected militants in crossfire instead of gathering information from them, he said, the government will not be able to thwart militancy by only using force and resorting to crossfire.”Terrorism and militancy must be tackled with democratic forces. There is a necessity for more freedom and more democracy to resist it. A democratic environment and freedom of expression must be restored to face the dangerous demon of militancy. But the government is deliberately avoiding it,” he added.It may be mentioned that Jatiyatabadi Help Cell has so far gave financial assistance to the family members of 31 enforced disappearance victims in the last two years.
