On the release of Begum Khaleda Zia

On March 25, 2020, the Bangladesh government released Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) chairperson and former prime minister Khaleda Zia from prison for six months.

The opposition leader has been in jail since February 8, 2018, after a special court passed two orders sentencing her for five years, and three years in two corruption cases. In October that year, the Dhaka high court dismissed her plea against the orders. The high court and the Supreme Court have together rejected her bail plea four times thus far.

The BNP claims that case and others against Khalda Zia and more than 30 other people are politically motivated.

Khaleda Zia had served as Bangladesh’s prime minister from 1991 to 1996 and from 2001 to 2006,

Khaleda Zia, the 74-year-old widow of former Bangladesh president Ziaur Rahman, has been ailing for some time. She was presently receiving treatment at the Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University in Dhaka. Zia’s family has repeatedly requested the Sheikh Hasina government to release her so that she could be airlifted to London for better treatment.

Welcoming the decision in a tweet, Amnesty International South Asia said, “We welcome the Bangladeshi authorities’ decision to conditionally release the opposition leader Begum Khaleda Zia from jail on humanitarian grounds. As she is suffering from a life-threatening illness, she must be given unrestricted access to the healthcare she needs.” Amnesty International has in the past expressed “deep concern” at the health condition of the detained leader.

Q M Jalal Khan, author of Bangladesh: Political and Literary Reflections on a Divided Country (2018) and Bangladesh Divided: Political and Literary Reflections on a Corrupt Police and Prison State (2019), has written this article which we believe needs critical evaluation. The article has few quotations in Bengali language which need translation for non-Bengali readers. Editor    Read More in pdf

 The Journal of America Team:

 Editor in chief:
Abdus Sattar Ghazali

Senior Editor:
Prof. Arthur Scott

Special Correspondent
Maryam Turab
 

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