By Ruma Paul
DHAKA (Reuters) – A United Nations team will meet with Bangladesh’s interim government and other stakeholders on Thursday to discuss the process for investigating alleged human rights abuses during recent deadly violence in the South Asian country, officials said.
About 300 people, many of them students, were killed during protests that began in July with students protesting against quotas for government jobs and then escalated into demonstrations to oust long-serving former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
After Hasina fled the country and flew to New Delhi following the student-led uprising, an interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus was sworn in.
The UN office in Bangladesh said in a press release that the team of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights will visit Dhaka from September 22 to 29.
“The purpose of this visit is to understand their priorities for assistance in promoting human rights,” the news agency said, adding that Bangladesh’s interim government had asked the UN to investigate the killings during the protests.
“It is important to note that this visit does not constitute an investigation, but focuses on discussing the process for investigating human rights violations in light of the recent violence and unrest.”
Rory Mungoven, head of the Asia-Pacific region at the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, led the UN team that met Foreign Minister Masud Bin Momen on Thursday, two Bangladeshi foreign ministry officials said.
UN human rights chief Volker Turk called Yunus last week and said a UN-led investigation into the killing of the protesters would be launched “very soon,” Yunus’ office said.
Once details are finalised, a separate investigation team will be sent to Dhaka in the coming weeks to conduct the probe, the UN said.
(Writing by Sudipto Ganguly; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)
