U.N. Calls Bangladesh Protest Crackdown a Possible Crime Against Humanity

The brutal crackdown on student protesters last year by Bangladesh’s former prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, killed as many as 1,400 people, a toll much higher than previously estimated, according to a U.N. report issued on Wednesday.

Ms. Hasina’s violent response to the student-led revolt, which ultimately ended her 15-year rule, involved extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests and torture, according to a U.N. fact-finding mission. The actions by Ms. Hasina and senior Bangladeshi officials possibly amounted to crimes against humanity, the U.N. report said.

“The testimonies and evidence we gathered paint a disturbing picture of rampant state violence and targeted killings that are amongst the most serious violations of human rights, and which may also constitute international crimes,” Volker Türk, the U.N. human rights chief, said in a statement.

It is clear that “the top echelons of the former government were aware and in fact involved in the commission of very serious violations,” Mr. Türk told reporters. Abuses included torture and ill-treatment of children and sexual violence against women, he said.

Ms. Hasina fled to India in August as the student protesters descended on her home. The government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi continues to harbor her as she uses her perch in India to intervene in Bangladesh’s politics, complicating the interim government’s efforts to rebuild the country’s democracy.

The caretaker administration, led by the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus, has applied for Ms. Hasina’s extradition on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity. The Indian government, long an ally of Ms. Hasina, has shown no sign of complying with the request.

The U.N. report examined clashes involving Ms. Hasina’s security forces, supporters of her political party and antigovernment protesters during a three-week period from July 15 to Aug. 5.

The great majority of those killed — 12 or 13 percent of whom were children, the United Nations estimated — were shot by security forces. Thousands of people suffered life-changing injuries from high-caliber rifles and shotguns often fired at close range, it said.

The U.N. fact-finding team’s 103-page report relied mainly on more than 230 interviews, including with protest leaders as well as current and former police and security officials. It also drew on video and geolocation technology to reconstruct and corroborate accounts of the protests.

According to graphic witness testimony, the police used an anti-riot vehicle to run over protesters while firing at them. In another case, a protester described how a police officer had shot and killed a wounded demonstrator she was holding in her arms, and then had shot at her.

In addition to the hundreds of young protesters killed, the police said that 44 of their officers had died during the demonstrations. Mr. Türk said that investigators had documented acts of revenge against supporters of Ms. Hasina’s political party after the protests, as well as against the police and some religious and Indigenous minorities.

The United Nations called for an investigation to determine criminal responsibility for the violations.

Mr. Türk said that many cases had already been filed with Bangladesh’s domestic tribunal handling international crimes. But he noted “challenges and deficiencies” in the Bangladeshi legal system and flagged the possibility of pursuing cases through countries with universal jurisdiction or through the International Criminal Court.

Mr. Türk emphasized the importance of legal accountability in helping Bangladesh transition out of its descent into authoritarianism and break the cycles of violence that have long shadowed Bangladeshi politics.

The release of the U.N. report came after a flare-up of political violence this month ignited by a speech that Ms. Hasina broadcast from India. Angry students bulldozed and set fire to a museum that had once been the residence of Ms. Hasina’s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, a founder of Bangladesh.

The students then clashed with supporters of Ms. Hasina’s party, which the interim government has barred from participating in the effort to remake the country’s political system.

The violence prompted the government to launch what it called Operation Devil Hunt, in which police and paramilitary units arrested more than 1,300 people, officials said.