A man jailed for eight years by the regime of former Bangladeshi ruler Sheikh Hasina said Dhaka police raided his family home after British journalists asked her niece, the city's British minister Tulip Siddique, about his ordeal.
Mir Ahmed Bin Qassim told the Financial Times that security personnel told his wife to “lay low” and halted media coverage hours before Channel 4 News broadcast footage of its journalists questioning Siddiq.
“It is clear that confronting Tulip over this case has struck a chord somewhere within the Sheikh’s family,” said Qasim, who was detained in a secret Bangladeshi prison without trial between 2016 and 2024. “So I'm sure that's what led to this knee-jerk reaction.” From management.”
Journalists from Channel 4 News called a friend in London on the morning of Saturday 25 November 2017 and suggested that “with one phone call you can make a big difference” to Qasim, who has Bangladeshi nationality.
Footage of the confrontation – in which Siddiq warned journalists not to suggest she was a Bangladeshi politician, saying “Be very careful what you say, I'm a British MP” – was broadcast three days later on the evening of 28 November.
Hours before the program aired, security personnel, including members of the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), a Bangladeshi police unit widely accused of human rights abuses, surrounded the family's home, according to Qasim.
Qasim said that approximately ten armed men entered the house and asked for his wife’s contact details abroad. He added: “It was as if they were chasing a terrorist.”
Qasim was first arrested in 2016 while serving on the legal team of his father, the leader of an Islamist party in Bangladesh. His release on August 6 last year came less than 24 hours after the release of Sheikh Hasina and her government from the Awami League. He was removed from power.
Trained as a lawyer in Britain, he was one of hundreds of detainees in the regime's notorious “House of Mirrors” prison, known by that name because detainees reported they had not seen anyone else for years. Qasim described his arrest as “worse than death,” saying he was handcuffed and deprived of sunlight.
Michael Bullock, Qasim's UK-based lawyer, said he believed the raid was an attempt to get Qasim's family to pressure Channel 4 News not to broadcast the footage.
“Here a member of parliament is properly asked about something, and this causes threats from a security service that is known to disappear, torture and kill people,” Pollock said.
foot open Last week, a friend owned a property in London that she acquired free of charge from a developer linked to the Awami League.
The Labor MP for Hampstead and Highgate has also lived in properties linked to party figures, including her current home in East Finchley.
Friend on Monday She pointed out herself And to the government's advisor on ministerial standards regarding her real estate holdings, saying she had “done nothing wrong.”
The International Criminal Court in Bangladesh on Monday issued arrest warrants for Sheikh Hasina and 11 of her senior officials for their alleged role in the enforced disappearance.
Siddiq's aunt was directly involved in the forced disappearance of thousands of people, according to a preliminary report published last month by a new investigation committee formed by the transitional government in Bangladesh.
Siddiq, who is in charge of combating illicit finance in the UK, was named in an investigation by the Bangladesh Anti-Corruption Commission last month.
The investigation came after a political rival of Sheikh Hasina accused her relatives, including a friend, of taking a share of a Russian-backed nuclear energy project.
Sheikh Hasina's family has also been accused of stealing money from Bangladesh's banking systems. They have denied the allegations.
“It is not possible to withdraw billions from a $10 billion project (the nuclear deal),” Sajeeb Wajid, Sheikh Hasina’s son and adviser, told Reuters last month. We also do not have any external accounts. I have lived in the US for 30 years, and my aunt and cousins have lived in the UK for a similar period. Obviously we have accounts here, but none of us have ever seen this kind of money before.
RAB, which was sanctioned by the United States in 2021 for its role in extrajudicial killings and disappearances, came under new leadership after the fall of Sheikh Hasina's government. A new law is being drafted to regulate its operations.
Qasim, who said his time in prison had left him “physically weak and psychologically traumatised”, called on British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to “seriously reconsider whether (Siddiq) is qualified for the responsibility given to her”.
Siddiq apologized after the Channel 4 report was broadcast about her behavior towards one of the programme's journalists.
The Financial Times contacted Siddiq and the Labor Party for comment. The friend did not respond to the request and the Labor Party declined to comment.
One of Siddiq's allies said Qasim was neither her constituent nor a British citizen, but she wrote to the Foreign Office in December 2017 to raise his case after constituents asked her to do so, in line with “correct protocol”. For the representative of the electoral district.
