Bangladesh takes bold step to break cycle of impunity: FM

Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali has said Bangladesh has taken the bold step to break the cycle of impunity and bring the offenders to justice in domestic war crimes trials.
“The present government pledges to lead by example in breaking the global culture of impunity by bringing to justice the perpetrators of sexual violence and crimes against humanity during Bangladesh’s 1971 War of Liberation,” he said while addressing the ‘Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict’ held in London on June 11-13, according to a news agency.
The Foreign Minister said 43 years after 200,000 Bengali women were subjected to crimes against humanity of horrendous proportions, including systematic and widespread rape, sexual torture, enslavement and forced pregnancy by occupying military forces and their auxiliary forces in 1971, Bangladesh has taken the bold step to break the cycle of impunity and bring the offenders to justice in domestic war crimes trials.
He was invited to the Summit by British Foreign Secretary William Hague and actress Angelina Jolie, Special Envoy of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, along with five Bangladesh experts on women, peace and security during conflict to deliberate on prevention of sexual crimes during ongoing conflicts around the world and ending impunity for war zone rape through the adoption of a ‘Protocol on investigation and documentation of sexual crimes during conflicts’ for improving prosecution of offenders.
Referring to the January 16, 2014 European Parliament resolution on Bangladesh, the Foreign Minister also apprised the Group that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina stands by her open invitation for dialogue with the BNP provided the latter dissociates itself from Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh.