But what got lost was what Saha did not say. And the fact that is not noticed today will make any teeth-gnashing and sloganeering the day Mojaheed’s sentence comes out quite moot.

Saha is trying to help the prosecution prove that Mojaheed murdered Saha’s father, Narayan Saha. According to Daily Star, here is the crucial part of his testimony (italics mine):

“At that time, there was a revolver in Mojaheed’s hand and the Biharis were carrying rifles. They tied my father Upendra Narayan Saha and some others,” said Sakti.

“When my mother and sister begged my father’s life offering their gold ornaments to them, they said my father would be released. But instead of releasing him, they lined up 10-12 people at Shree Angan,” he said adding, “Then Mojaheed made some signal and sounds of gunshots were heard.”

“Bullets hit my father and others and they collapsed. After half an hour, I went there and found my father’s body lying on the ground,” said emotion-chocked[sic] Sakti.

Bullets hit my father? Who speaks in the passive voice at a time like this? Not “Mojaheed shot my father.” Not “Mojaheed signalled the Biharis to shoot my father.” And this is not just Daily Star being Daily Star, the other newspapers, both Bangla and English, have similar reports.

Besides, “sounds of gunshot were heard” and then “bullets hit my father.” The first part sounds like the testimony of a man who is hiding and cannot see what is going on, but is close enough to hear. The second part sounds like the testimony of a man who is hiding and can see the victims, but not the shooters. A direct eyewitness to a gun homicide never comments on the sound of gunshot; he says “I saw X get hit by a bullet and fall down.”

Given the extremely low bar that Bangladesh’s ICT has set for pronouncing guilty verdicts, this may not be a problem. The Tribunal’s approach so far has been that if you have affiliation with Jamaat, Shibir, or any such organizations in 1970, you are a bad person. These affiliations can be proven by testimony, newspaper clippings, hearsay, anything.

Murders, rapes, destruction of property, and all bad things, can also be proven similarly.

So the only test is whether the bad person was present when the bad thing took place. The only acquittal that we have seen so far, regarding Abdul Quader Mollah in Charge 4, took place because the prosecution could not conclusively prove that he was present when the bad thing took place.

In this particular matter, this may not be a problem. Saha clearly puts Mojaheed in the scene of the crime. That would not suffice in a normal court of law, or even a normal Bangladeshi court, but of course, this is neither.

Several years ago a high court judge in Bangladesh was secretly tape recorded asking for bribe. Great hue and cry ensued. The judge was removed from his position by the president.

Yet no one questioned or bothered with the illegality of secretly tape recording a judge talking about a sub-judis matter.

However when another judge, Nizamul Huq Nasim of Bangladesh International Crimes Tribunal — dealing with a much much more serious matter, where at least eight lives are at stake– is tape recorded while discussing about his case, the dominant thought process of people around me is focused about the technicality and illegality of the hacking. Very few people seems bothered with the crime the judge just committed. This, this or this are some examples.

If one asks me — this judge’s crime is much worse than the crimes of the Afghan judge or the corrupt judge of Bangladesh High Court. We should not and cannot divert the focus away from the crime to the messenger.

All those are gone these days. People I meet these days in weekly NRB socialization called dawats, are not the people of my choice/ type – rather they happen to live around be in the foreign land. So I really do not get much influenced by the people I meet there. Instead, my campus world, my rock er addar world has now been replaced with a virtual world – my facebook world, the twitter world, the wordpress/ blogspot world, the youtube world.

I read the emotions of the people of similar mindset from reading Facebook and twitter feeds. My Facebook world was in seriously jolted by two recent deaths. The news feeds, in blogs, tweets bemoaned the deaths of educationist Mr Khan Sarwar Murshid and today Pandit Maestro Ravi Shankar.

Today I was looking for the news report of funeral of Mr. Murshid. I was hoping to write an obituary blog about him. I did not find any. Probably that was a private event- I am not sure. But another funeral caught my attention. This is the photo of a portion of the crowd gathered in the Namaj -e Janaja ( Last religious rite) of Mufti Amini. Media reported that over 100,000 people attended the funeral. One of the biggest in recent years in Bangladesh.
Although he pulls hundreds of thousands people come out in the street mourning for him at the middle of the night – I did not hear of his death in my Facebook feeds. No one mourned or remembered him in blogs. I also did not care his death at all. For many unrelated reasons, I thought ” Good Riddance”.

However this discrepancy does not surprise me much. We live in a very dichotomous world. While I am connected, million fold effectively easily than any other time in history, with people of my creed across the globe- irrespective of geographic locations and time zones — I am equally more intensely and deeply disconnected with people next door who may not belong to my community.

This is my new communal life.

Source: Al Jazeera

I have already been recommended to read at least three blogs about the recent hacked Skype conversations between International Crimes Tribunal Chairman Justice Nizamul Hoque and a Belgium based Bangladeshi expatriate lawyer Ahmed Ziauddin. All three have the same content, same tone, same desperation. Damage control. Attempts to make people believe that the Skype discussion between the judge and the expatriate lawyer is nothing unusual, in good faith and is perfectly valid.

The folks who wrote those blogs or who shared/ recommended those blogs definitely has one thing to share. They all want the defendants to be executed by hanging. For them the guilt of defendants are foregone conclusion, the trial is just a formality to showcase to the west and it is unimaginable for them that the defendants can be found Not guilty.

But my take on the leaked material, which I heard in youtube and read in Bangla Daily Amar desh is very different from the above spins.

My problems are with the following:

1. On several occasions I heard about discussions between Ahmed Ziauddin and Chief prosecutor Malum. It seemed the judge was in touch with prosecution either directly or via this Ziauddin outside of courtroom setting. From multiple tapped discussion it becomes clear that the judges, the prosecution, some pro trial activists inside and outside the country were working together to write the judgement! I feel that even a child should understand that this is absolutely unacceptable. How can a judge keep in touch outside the courtroom with one side of the arbitration on such a constant basis!

2. It is very clear that Ahmed Ziauddin was advising Nizamul Haque about how to write the judgement. It also came clear that Mr. Ziauddin was writing for Justice Hoque the basic framework of the verdict. The questions, who is this Ahmed Ziauddin. Has he been declared a amicus curie? When? Is there any record in the trial proceedings that Mr AHmed Ziauddin is a legal advisor or Amicus Curie? On what capacity Mr. Ziauddin contribute to the ICT judgement?

3. It was clearly heard that the judge was discussing the details of day to day proceedings in minute details with Mr. Ziauddin. Can a judge do this on a sub judis matter? Not going into the content of the discussion, if any judge is found doing such thing in any proceeding in the civilized world, won’t it mandate a mistrial declaration?

4 On multiple occasions the judge himself confesses that he rejected defense petitions without even reading the petition. He was also heard bragging how he is entrapping the defense and ensuring that defense does not get the time it wanted.

5. This judge was clearly heard making demeaning comments about other sitting judges. In one occasion the judge declares another judge as a “thief”. In another conversation, he claims one one of his newly recruited colleague is corrupt and involved with gold smuggling. For these statements, this judge should face contempt of court.

Ruling Awami League party activists chop an innocent man to death. They suspected that he was an opposition activist supporting the nationwide blockade. Recently, Home Minister has urged party activists to take over law enforcement and resist opposition activities.

In 1971 some folks supported Pakistani army kill Bangali freedom fighters and Independence loving people. 40 years later we still want revenge — we want them killed — judicially on non-judicially.

Can the two women in the picture — the family of the killed, demand the same — kill those who committed the killing and who ordered the killing and who facilitated the killing?

“When the first blow felt, blood must have spurted out. Whose face floated in front of your eyes? Your mother Kalpana Das, who used every bit of love to grow this human, born from a drop of polluted blood? Or was it father Ananta Das, who drained his own body to bring that one new shirt for a young boy’s wish? Or another loved one, who would remove the fallen hair from forehead and give a shy smile and hide? But why do we still cry when we see another Bishyajit die? Is this anything new? Bishyajits were born to die. For decades they have been dying. Those who want to “help” (!) the country, they have some small addiction to hunting. To sate their hunger, it is the Bishyajits who have to be the hunted deer. When the arrow pierces deep inside his heart, the thrill of hunt fulfills the powerful.”
“প্রথম কোপটি যখন শরীরে পড়লো, নিশ্চয়ই ফিনকি দিয়ে রক্ত ঝরলো, কার চেহারাটি চোখের সামনে ভেসে উঠেছিল তখন? মা কল্পনা দাস, যে নিজের সবটুকু মমতা ঢেলে এক ফোঁটা দূষিত রক্তের দলাকে তিল তিল করে মানুষ বিশ্বজিতের রূপ দিয়েছেন? নাকি বাবা অনন্ত দাস, শরীরের প্রতিটি রক্তবিন্দু ঘামে রূপান্তর করে যে নতুন শার্টটি এনেছেন ছেলের আব্দার পূরণ করতে? নাকি অন্য কোনো প্রিয়জনের, যে কপালে এসে পড়া চুলটি সরিয়ে লাজুক হেসে আড়ালে লুকাতো? কিন্তু এখনো কেন আমরা কষ্ট পাই বিশ্বজিতদের মরতে দেখলে! এ কি নতুন হলো? বিশ্বজিৎদের তো মরতেই হবে। যুগে যুগে মরেছেও। দেশের যারা কল্যাণ (!) চায়, তাদের এক-আধটু শিকারের নেশা থাকবে। তাদের খায়েশ মেটাতে হরিণ শাবক তো বিশ্বজিৎরাই হবে। তীরের ফলা বিশ্বজিৎদের বুকের যতো গভীরে গেঁথে যাবে, শিকারের মজাতো ততই বেশি হবে ক্ষমতা লিপ্সুদের।”

“He had a tailor shop in Dhaka. 6 years ago Bishyajit started this tailoring business in Dhaka’s Shakhari Bazaar. Sunday while he was walking to the shop [during the hartal], a gang of men attacked him with machetes and hacked him to death… His family informed that Bishyajit was not connected with any political party.”
“ঢাকায় তার একটি দর্জি দোকান আছে। ৬ বছর আগে ঢাকার শাখারি বাজারে দর্জি ব্যবসা শুরু করেন বিশ্বজিৎ। রোববার দোকানে যাওয়ার পথে কিছু লোক তাকে কুপিয়ে ও পিটিয়ে মারাত্মক আহত করে।.. বিশ্বজিতের কোনো রাজনৈতিক দলের সঙ্গে সংশ্লিষ্টতা ছিলো না বলে তার পরিবার জানান।”

বিশ্বজিৎ, ক্ষমা করো ভাই, ক্ষমা করো তোমার প্রভুকে! – সাজেদা সুইটি
http://www.banglanews24.com/detailsnews.php?nssl=88b7bdd71070c765de2f6a94525baf23

Bishyajit das being attacked. BanglaNews24

Bishyajit Das being attacked. Banglanews24

Ironically, when it seems Bangladesh is exceedingly committed to fix the history, close all the historical wrongdoings and champion Bangalee nationalism — the death anniversary of the most prominent leaders of early Bangalee nationalism remains in extreme obscurity. The flag bearers of Sohrawardi, Bhashani, Shamsul Haque, Mujib’s Awami League are very eager to trample everybody else to promote and talk about only leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman – who is called Bangabandhu. We are taught that we only have ” এক নেতার এক দেশ”. We only have a founding father. The history of our nation did not exist before Bangabandhu Mujib. Like Jesus we do not have any forefathers, we do not have anything before, after beyond Sheikh Mujibur Rahman — our PM’s father and our Bangabandhu.

We know what happens to anyone who can be remotely competing with our PM’s natuonal and international stature. We have seen the ordeal of Muhammad Yunus.

We are also seeing a systemic campaign to destroy — either by distortion or by obscurity — anyone who may remotely be seen as a threat to Mujib’s sole role in our history. Just few days ago, on the anniversary of death of Maolana Bhashani – our president takes the stage to defame him!

Just wiki Hossain Shaheed Sohrawardi. All you see inputs from a Pakistan POV. While our ever enthusiastic youngsters fill the cyberspace crying to close the atrocities of 1971, worshiping Banglaee nationalism and it’s leader Bangabandhu — not a single of the wiki editors bother to do some historical justice to Hossain Shaheed Sohrawardi.

Source: bdnews24.com

The second term Sheikh Hasina Government has taken the country to a low of unbelievable proportion. Injustice, anarchy, suppression, hypocrisy — all have attained a level beyond the most skeptic’s wildest nightmarish imagination. Be it judiciary, be it defense forces, be it police forces, be it medical profession — all the government jobs are grabbed by political cadres and goons of the ruling party.

Let’s talk about assistant judge Javed Imam. This man was caught with a huge supply of illicit drugs when he was transporting those from a border district to capital city Dhaka. Definitely he and his handlers thought his position of a judge will ensure his protection and immunity from police checks.

Like any other drug haul or arms haul, this case was also published in newspaper with photographs. This is a news media tradition to report such hauls.

Under second Hasina regime the judiciary in Bangladesh has earned extreme notoriety to abusing contempt of court for all sort of personal or partisan or vested interests. e.g. a judge purchased an economy class sit for his personal trip via Government owned airlines Bangladesh Biman — he calls the chairman, Managing Director, Politics, cabin crew to his court for contempt for not automatically upgrading his ticket to First Class. All a police did was to ask a judges car to stop at red light. The judge made the police do ten situps holding his ear and then called all the top police bureaucracy for contempt of court.

So when the news that a judge was caught red handed in illicit drug haul, the skeptic in me wanted to make a joke as a caption to the news. The caption I wanted to make was that our judiciary would charge the police for contempt because they arrested the judge in this drug haul. But the sanity, the reason, the sense of practicality in me stopped me from doing such an extreme joke.

But it seems under Hasina’s second rule, insanity in Bangladesh have crossed the limit of sanity. It is insanely insane these days.

Our judiciary acted swiftly to protect it’s sanctity.  Court indeed called five police official to court for letting journalists photograph the judge with the drug haul.

First, what is the point of this op-ed? From the concluding paragraph:

The more this unity is strengthened, the greater the chances that Bangladesh will move ahead in a positive direction. The Awami League must learn from it’s mistakes from the era of 1972-’75 just as the ‘left’ should comprehend how its immediate shift to an oppositional position after Liberation was a premature step. We need to know our true foes – the defeated anti-liberation forces of 1971, which are still lurking around waiting for an opportunity to strike back. Also, we need to identify our true friends. We can not afford to distance ourselves from each other like we did in 1972 and in the years that followed. The unity of democratic and progressive forces infused with muktijuddher chetona was successful in 1971 and there is no doubt it shall be successful again if it takes lessons from the errors of the past.

So, in his own words, he is concerned about strengthening the alliance between JSD (the party championed by his uncle that he will head one day). That part is perfectly understandable; it is by dint of this alliance that JSD now has Members of Parliament and even, miracle of miracles, cabinet ministers. The second part is more subtle, and thus, interesting. “We need to identify our true friends”- so, to warn Caesar of enemies lurking both externally and internally, so to speak.

I very much enjoyed reading this op-ed. Because of his personal background and family history, Mr. Hossain is more pro-Awami League than actual Awami League leaders. Yet, because of the admittedly complex agenda he inherits, he cannot write the usual anti-Zia diatribe portraying Bangladesh between 1972 and 1975 as the land of milk and honey that all went horribly wrong on August 1975. He does the best with the hand he is dealt.

Consider this. A standard trope of Awami propaganda is that it was only post-Mujib administrations, and especially President Ziaur Rahman, who filled top administrative posts with officers with overt or covert Pakistani leaning. Yet, as Mr. Hossain himself alleges:

• Captain Hakim, who fought with Pakistan against Bangladesh during all nine months of the Liberation War, was, by March 1972, chief of Dhaka Transit Camp and of Army’s Military Police.
• Col. Salahuddin, who was the principal razakar recruiting officer for the Pakistani Army, served as Military Secretary to Bangladesh’s first and second Presidents, Justice Abu Sayeed Chowdhury and Mahmudullah respectively. Colonel Salauddin would also be part of President Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s staff in 1975 (op. cit.) and President Ziaur Rahman’s first Military Secretary.
• Col. Masud, who had directly collaborated with the Pakistani Army, almost became Bangladesh Army’s first Adjutant General until Col. Taher successfully lobbied to have himself inserted into that position.
• The appointments of Lt. Col. KM Rahman as head of the Army’s supply unit, Air Commodore Aminul Islam as Chief of the DGFI and Lt. Al Farid and Lt. Modabber into the police forces were suspect since all these individuals had collaborated directly with the Pakistan Army during 1971.
• A.M.S. Safdar, who, as the leading intelligence officer of the Ayub regime in East Pakistan, would literally ‘carry the prosecutor’s briefcase into the court every day’ during the Agartala Trial, would be appointed to the President’s Vigilance Team, a police security unit dealing with corruption, intelligence and domestic order.
• Abdur Rahim – former Director of Pakistan’s Razakar forces, would be appointed Secretary to the President.

And this is not to mention the continuous rise of Khandakar Mushtaq Ahmed in independent Bangladesh as well as the commensurate decline of Tajuddin Ahmed, and you cannot help but scratch your head.

Mr. Hossain’s piece is also a fascinating study in how propaganda and lies, once sprouted, continue to circulate and take on a life of their own, sometimes quite separately from their original uses. Prothom Alo ran several rather innocuous American diplomatic cables to insinuate that Zia was somehow complicit in the August 1975 massacre. Mr. Hossain goes one step further and tries to show, as he must, that Khaled Mosharraf was also somehow complicit in this conspiracy. The same Khaled Mosharraf, who is often nowadays painted by Awami League as the good officer/coup-maker, and whose brother was made a MP and state minister by Hasina in 1996.

As impressive as Mr. Hossain is, once cannot wonder whether his youth blinds him to several tactical mistakes he committed in this article. The most glaring would be to claim that JSD was on its way to union with BKSAL.

This may sound surprising to many historians but after the formation of BAKSAL in 1975 Sheikh Fazlul Huq Moni had secretly met with Sirajul Alam Khan at the residence of Ms. Jahanara, the Assistant Editor of Banglar Bani. Fakir Abdur Razzak, a close aide to Sheikh Moni recalls: “The main objective of these meetings was to bring JSD into the broad national unity that Bangabandhu had called upon. Later on I heard that Moni bhai had succeeded to convince Sirajul Alam Khan in principle, but Khan and his political colleagues had refrained at that point in time from being named members of any BAKSAL committee.”

The creation of BKSAL probably stands as the single greatest tragedy in Bangladesh’s history; a blight which we have not been able to escape to this day. That Mr. Hossain speaks longingly of the possibility of the merger between BKSAL and his JSD speaks poorly about both his understanding of Bangladeshi history as well as his commitment to democratic principles.

It is possibly ironic that in the months before his fall, Sheikh Mujib was often more comfortable listening to the advice of Leftist politicians rather than his own colleagues, a position that may be familiar to his daughter. One hopes that in the future, some other bright young person will not have to write another op-ed and lament how Hasina failed to identify her true friends. That would be a fitting wish to make on the anniversary of this tragic day.

Source: bdnews24

Let me start by asking you all a question. You may have a very strong religious affiliation; your faith may be impeccable. Or you may be deeply indoctrinated with a political ideology. Passion runs deep in your vain in favor of your faith or ideology. But does this passion permit you to break the basic law of humanity, i.e. kill innocent people? And if you do any such act out of this strong political of religious conviction, can you get away saying that it’s not my fault, some religious or political leader used my passion to make me commit such crime?

Let me be more specific. As alleged by the law enforcement agencies of USA, Bangladeshi student Kazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis planned and attempted to detonate a weapon of mass destruction in New York City of USA. It is however alleged that through the sting operation, in fact an undercover FBI agent pretending to be a fellow Muslim with a Jihadi passion, influenced, provoked and facilitated Nafis to commit the alleged actions of terror.
This may be true that Nafis’s insecure unstable mindset was heavily influenced by the FBI agent. But it also true that Nafis indeed attempted to commit a major crime. If a religious cleric or a best friend or a person who you respect immensely, asks you to kill people or blow up cities for Jihad, will you agree? Let alone causing a massacre, will any of you ever be able to be convinced by the best of your friends to murder only one innocent person for the best of the causes? I have no doubt; the answer will be an emphatic and unanimous ‘No’. And this makes you different from Nafis.
The majority of 9/11 airplane bombers were clueless students like Nafis. Instead of an FBI agent, the person who influenced them was a man named Mohammad Atta. And as a result we saw the devastation of 9/11. Just try to think what Nafis would have done, if the person influencing Nafis was someone like Mohammad Atta instead of undercover FBI agent. Yes, Nafis was influenced by religion and provoked by the FBI undercover agent. But that does not clear Nafis of the horrendous crime he attempted to commit. Even a ten year old boy has the capacity to differentiate from good to bad and refuse to do the wrong thing. Nafis, in contrast is an emotionally competent adult.
Few decades ago, thousands of young men of this region of Indian sub-continent, influenced by a revolutionary leader named Charu Mazumder, started killing innocent people in the name of red revolution and class warfare. Law enforcement agency members hunted down all those thousands of bright young men one by one and then either killed them or maimed them for life or threw them in prisons. Nobody gave them a pass because they committed all the crimes being influenced by an extreme band of Marxism or by Charu Mazumder.

Now the question you may ask, how we can be so sure that Nafis indeed did all the crimes the FBI is attributing to him? What is the guarantee that FBI is not making things up? OK, it seems FBI is proceeding with normal US judicial process. FBI says they have all the audio recordings of conversations as well as the suicide video message Nafis recorded. Before even the trial of Nafis can proceed, i.e. before even Nafis can be charge sheeted (Indicted in US legal terms), all these evidences must be seen by a group of randomly selected New York resident. Once this group of people, called the Grand Jury, is convinced that FBI evidence is sufficient to proceed with a trial, then a jury trial will begin. During this lengthy process, Nafis will be able to meet and talk to any lawyer he decides to employ. Nafis will also be able to meet people from Bangladesh embassy. Nafis will get numerous chances to say and prove that all these are false. The trial will be open to public and all proceedings of the trial will be public record. And the persons who will look at the evidence and decide whether Nafis is guilty or not are not the judges, rather members of a jury. This jury will be randomly selected from New York and there is all the statistical possibility that a Bangladeshi American or a Muslim American may be part of the jury. After all the rigorous and transparent scrutiny of the evidence, it will be very difficult for the Government to punish a defendant with fake and unsubstantiated evidence. And if the evidence is not strong enough, Nafis will be freed and exonerated.

_ _ _

The case of Nafis brings forward some other very relevant issues and demands discussion. The problem with Nafis did not start with his arrest. The problem started way before that.
First problem, was Nafis prepared (Emotionally, academically and financially) to move to USA to study and struggle to make a career? From media reports and statements of the University Nafis attended in Dhaka, it is clear that Nafis was having difficulty with studies even in Bangladesh. How can we expect that a student, who, even in the most favorable circumstances i.e. no financial responsibility, free boarding and dinning at parent’s place, cannot cope with the studies, will be able to make it in USA? Here in USA, in addition to full load of studies foreign students must enroll, he was expected to work to earn his tuition and make his ends meet.
It is true that parents in Bangladesh want to believe that sending the kid overseas will solve all the problems. The kid is not catching up with studies, the kid is too lazy, the kid is having drug problem – send him abroad and all the problems will be solved! This is blissful ignorance.
Yes, in the past young people came this way and ultimately made a living in USA and other places. But the world has changed. The events of 9/11 have changed the whole west, not only USA. Also changed is the economic situation in the Americas and Europe. In the past there were lots of low end jobs and foreign students were tapped to do those jobs. It is not like that anymore. In America, unemployment rate is very high. Government is cracking down on employers who hire people without legal documents to work.
It is also important to understand that undergraduate studies in USA are a protracted process. Student life could have been much easier if one comes to USA to graduate level education after finishing undergraduate studies in Bangladesh. A student who comes to USA for a Master’s degree is much more likely to complete his education and join the work forces, either here in USA or back home in Bangladesh.
Another point also worth mention is that the moment Nafis transferred from the first school in Missouri to a non-degree offering technical training institute in New York City, he decidedly pulled himself out of education-professional job track. The institute he enrolled in in New York would not give him any degree that would enable him to be considered as skilled employee. It seemed he moved to New York to work and earn money for living. This path is a very slippery slope and there were high chances of losing legal status in USA. In the past decades thousands of Bangladeshis dropped out of universities, moved to New York for easier life and ultimately ended up spending the rest of their American under constant uncertainty as an Illegal alien in USA.
_ _ _

But the most glaring problem in this Nafis fiasco is the blatant double standard that is being shown in Bangladesh. Since this government came to power, on the excuse of zero tolerance to Islamic extremism, young men, suspected of having the slightest connections to Islamist organizations, are being rounded up and taken into custody. Unlike Nafis case, in most of these cases the families of the young men have no clue of their whereabouts. People are being kept in custody for indefinite period without any charges or hope for any chance of transparent trial in near future. There are also allegations that some young men suspected of having Islamist connections are facing enforced disappearances. Professors, physicians, students are being incarcerated indefinitely for merely being members of Islamist groups like Hijbut Tahrir.
At least, it seems Nafis is going get a due and transparent judicial process, which the Nafises in Bangladesh are not getting.
Let me end this piece with another question. If a foreign student in Bangladesh or even a Bangladeshi citizen is caught red handed while trying to blow up our Parliament building or while planning to harm our leaders, what treatment, you think, the culprits will get at the hand of our law enforcement agencies? Would this really matter who or what influenced the person planning to destroy our parliament building? If the wrath of Bangladesh legal system can come down on that alleged culprit with full vigor, what is the problem with US legal system clamping down on a foreign student who planned and wanted to destroy the main US city or kill the US president?

This a 14 year old girl from one of the most socially backward, deprived and uncivilized areas of the World — Swat Valley pakistan.

Her name is Malala Yousufzai. Although she is only a 14 year old 8th grader, she definitely is not like any other 14 year old in the world.

She is an embodiment of passion, bravado, activism. She is the example what ‘standing up for right’ means in real life.
She probably is the youngest and most inspirational politicians in Asia, if not in the World. Just search her name in Youtube. You will see hundreds of TV interviews of Malala — some 30 minute, some hour long. You will see her fiery stump speeches.

The taliban of Pak-Afghan border defeated super power Soviet union with their gun. The same Taliban is eyeing another decisive victory against the remaining superpower, The USA. They thought they can engage any enemy with their guns and win the battle. Those cowards shot this 14 year old girl in the head.
These Talibans – these angels of backwardness and darkness, do not know that their guns will not win the war for them against all. Malala is symbol of progress and freedom. She meant education and liberty of Muslim women. This is way much super a power than all the colonial invaders.
These cowards will lose the battle this time. Those Talibans don’t know empowerment, education, progress, advancement — collectively is much more powerful that colonial powers.

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Laura Bush Washington Post Op-Ed on attack on Malala

English translated Excerpts on the Diary of Malala from BBC