The United Nations has called on Bangladesh to “fully investigate” the recent killing of a publisher and bring the perpetrators to book.
“We would clearly condemn the killing of the publisher we saw in Bangladesh, and we would very much call on the government to fully investigate and bring the perpetrators to justice,” said Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN secretary-general.
He made the comment in response to a question at the daily press briefing at the UN headquarters on Monday.
Earlier, UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh Robert D Watkins strongly condemned the brutal killing of publisher Faisal Arefin Dipan and the continued violence against the online community.
He said the killing must be condemned at all levels of political and religious leadership in order to prevent further attacks. “The perpetrators must also be brought to justice and the authorities need to provide immediate protection to citizens thought to be at risk,” he said.
CPJ CONDEMNS ATTACK ON PUBLISHERS
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) denounced two attacks in Dhaka on Saturday that killed publisher Faisal Arefin Dipan and injured another publisher Ahmedur Rashid Chowdhury Tutul.
Their publishing houses — Jagriti and Shuddhoswar — published a number of books written by slain Bangladeshi-American blogger-writer Avijit Roy.
“The extreme violence against independent voices in Bangladesh has extended to those who give these voices a platform,” said CPJ’s Asia Programme Research Associate Sumit Galhotra, according to a CPJ news alert issued in New York on November 2.
“We call on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to take a clear, bold stance against the rising tide of extremism in the country and to bring the perpetrators behind these attacks to justice,” he added.
On Saturday, two writers-bloggers Tareq Rahim and Ranadipam Basu were also injured in one of the attacks at Shuddhoswar’s Lalmatia office.
Avijit, who was hacked to death in Dhaka in February, is one of four bloggers murdered in the country this year.
The killing of bloggers in Bangladesh propelled the country onto Global Impunity Index of CPJ.
Bangladesh ranked 12th on CPJ’s 2015 Impunity Index published on October 8, which spotlights countries where journalists are murdered and their killers go unpunished.
A wave of violence against bloggers has landed Bangladesh back onto the index for the first time since 2011.
Dipan was stabbed to death at his office in the capital’s Shahbagh Aziz Super Market on Saturday after unknown assailants critically injured Tutul the same day.
Source: The Daily Star
