Kolkata: American sanctions are back to haunt Bangladesh. The US has imposed a travel ban on former Bangladesh army chief General Aziz Ahmed and his family over “his involvement in significant corruption”. Ahmed and his family are now “generally ineligible for entry to the US”, the US Department of State said in a 20 May statement.
“His actions have contributed to the undermining of Bangladesh’s democratic institutions and the public’s faith in public institutions and processes,” the statement by Matthew Miller, US State Department spokesperson, said.
The US has accused Aziz Ahmed of engaging in what it said was “significant corruption” by interfering in public processes while helping his brother evade accountability for criminal activity within Bangladesh.
“Aziz also worked closely with his brother to ensure the improper awarding of military contracts and accepted bribes in exchange for government appointments for his personal benefit,” the statement read.
The ruling Awami League, however, maintains that the Bangladesh government is not bothered by America’s strong-arm tactics.
“(The US) tried to meddle in our internal affairs in the run-up to our national elections this January. But Hasina returned to power with the people’s mandate for a historic fourth term,” Shammi Ahmed, MP and international affairs secretary of the Awami League’s central working committee, told ThePrint. “These old tactics won’t work anymore. America should mind its own business.”
However, Bangladesh’s principal opposition party, Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), has described the US move as a matter of shame for the entire country.
Speaking to ThePrint, BNP leader Nipun Roychowdhury claimed that it highlights Hasina’s failure to curb corruption and nepotism in administration, both within the government and the armed forces.
Roychowdhury also alleged that Hasina used law enforcement agencies and armed forces to “steal votes” during the 2018 elections and subvert the democratic process, resulting in America imposing restrictions on the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) — Bangladesh’s elite anti-terror paramilitary force — in 2021.
“In return for the role they (RAF) played in bringing the Awami League back in power illegally, the Hasina administration allowed rampant corruption and bribery in the armed forces. Sadly, America has to take action for the wrongdoings within the country. Hasina is solely responsible for the current crisis,” she said.
The US move has also bothered Dhaka’s media circles, though most view it as a recurrent pattern.
Senior journalist Sahidul Hasan Khokon noted that the Bangladeshi press was aware of impending visa restrictions on Aziz even before the January 7 elections, even though the US administration had not announced any names then.
“Now, they have announced his name and also said his immediate family will not be allowed to travel to the US,” Khokon told ThePrint.
Khokon cautioned that the Hasina government should not assume that since the elections are over, the US will cease meddling in Bangladesh’s internal affairs. Dhaka must remain vigilant about America’s next steps, he said.
Ahmed was Bangladesh’s chief of army staff from June 2018 to June 2021. Starting in 2012, he also served as the chief of Border Guard Bangladesh for four years.
According to the US State Department, the travel ban on General Aziz and his family reaffirms the US commitment to “strengthening democratic institutions and rule of law in Bangladesh”.
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Old tactics, new targets
Old sanctions that the US imposed on the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), meanwhile, continue despite the Bangladesh government calling for their removal.
“The matter was a topic of discussion during US Assistant Secretary of State (for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs) Donald Lu’s visit to Dhaka in mid-May. But, following Lu’s return, State Department spokesman Vedanta Patel made clear that the sanctions against RAB would not be lifted,” bdnews24 reported on 21 May.
In December 2021, the US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on the RAB, blocking the property of six current and former officers. It also imposed a travel ban on one of the six for “serious human rights violations” during the Bangladesh government’s “war on drugs”.
Leading up to the 7 January national elections, where Sheikh Hasina was elected prime minister for a historic fourth term, the US publicly stated its desire to strengthen democracy and ensure free and fair elections in Bangladesh.
On 22 September last year, the US Department of State announced that it was taking steps to impose visa restrictions on Bangladeshi individuals “responsible for, or complicit in, undermining the democratic election process in Bangladesh”.
The statement issued by spokesperson Miller at the time said that “these individuals include members of law enforcement, the ruling party, and the political opposition”. He added that “their immediate family may be found ineligible for entry into the United States”.
Miller further said that US actions reflected its commitment to supporting Bangladesh’s goal of “peacefully holding free and fair national elections, and to support those seeking to advance democracy globally”.
The US did not stop at that. Bangladeshi media reported that Matthew Beh, the first political secretary at the US embassy, met Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami leader Syed Abdullah Muhammad Taher on 16 October 2023, three months before the crucial national elections in the country.
According to the Bangladeshi media, the meeting did not go down well with either the Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League government or the civil society and rights groups in Bangladesh.
Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, formerly known as Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, had opposed the formation of Bangladesh. Many Jamaat leaders were found guilty of murder, rape, and genocide during the 1971 Liberation War. To this day, the Jamaat openly advocates for Sharia law in Bangladesh and has often been accused of targeting the country’s minorities.
Soon after Beh’s meeting with Taher, the Bangladeshi Supreme Court on 19 November 2023 dismissed an appeal by Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, seeking to overturn a 2013 ruling that barred it from participating in elections for violating the constitutional provision of secularism, effectively barring Jamaat from participating in the 7 January national polls.
Even after Sheikh Hasina got the people’s mandate to rule Bangladesh for the next five years, the US said it was concerned “by the arrests of thousands of political opposition members and by reports of irregularities on election day”.
A 9 January Reuters report, published after the Bangladesh polls, quoted a US State Department spokesperson saying that the United States shares the view with other observers that the elections were not free or fair, and “we regret that not all parties participated”.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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