The Bangladesh central bank has withdrawn a proposal to make counterfeiting currency notes a capital offence after Germany’s central bank said it would suspend a plan to help the Bangladeshi bank because of the death penalty threat.
Bangladesh Bank governor Atiur Rahman said a proposal to impose the death penalty for forgery had been forwarded by a central bank anti-counterfeiting committee to the government without his knowledge.
“It’s unfortunate to send such an inhuman proposal,” Rahman told Reuters, adding that he only learned of the proposal on Thursday after Reuters reported that Germany’s Bundesbank said it had put on ice plans to assist the Bangladeshi bank.
Rahman said as soon as he learned of the death penalty proposal, he ordered it recalled.
“It went mistakenly without thorough review,” he said.
The German central bank said on Thursday it was not aware of the plan to impose the death penalty for making fake currency when it agreed to the cooperation.
“The Bundesbank thinks that counterfeiting is a serious offence, but considers the threat of a death penalty as excessive,” it said in a statement, adding that its Bangladeshi project would be terminated before it started unless the plan to impose the death penalty was scrapped.
There has been no death penalty in the Federal Republic of Germany since its founding in 1949.
Source: The Daily Star
