(RSF/IFEX) – A photojournalist has been charged with “murder” after refusing to hand over photographs to police. The photographs he took showed police firing at demonstrators at a polling station, killing two of them. On 10 May 2004, freelance journalist Aurobindo Pal was arrested by police in Mymensingh district, northern Bangladesh, after refusing to hand […]
(RSF/IFEX) – A photojournalist has been charged with “murder” after refusing to hand over photographs to police. The photographs he took showed police firing at demonstrators at a polling station, killing two of them.
On 10 May 2004, freelance journalist Aurobindo Pal was arrested by police in Mymensingh district, northern Bangladesh, after refusing to hand over his negatives. The police subsequently filed a murder charge against Pal to ensure he could not be released on bail.
RSF expressed concern that police have once again arrested a Bangladeshi journalist on false grounds. The organisation urged Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Moudud Ahmed to intervene with the relevant authorities to obtain the journalist’s release and the lifting of the murder charge.
RSF also called for the punishment of Police Officer Khohinoor Miah, who was implicated in Pal’s arrest and other human rights violations, including the torture of journalist Saleem Samad in 2002 (see IFEX alerts of 4 February, 20, 15, 9, 7, 6 and 2 January 2003 and others).
On 9 May 2004, a riot broke out at a polling station in the city of Nandail, where local elections were being held. On Officer Miah’s orders, police fired into the crowd, killing two demonstrators and injuring at least 17 others. Pal took photographs of the incident.
That night, police turned up at the journalist’s home to seize his negatives. Despite threats of reprisals, Pal refused. Police searched his home and one officer said he had been ordered to arrest him if he failed to comply.
The journalist, who is also deputy chairman of the city’s press club, is scheduled to appear before a Nandail court on 12 May. He cannot be released on bail because he is charged with “murder” under Article 302 of the Criminal Code. Mymensingh’s district administrator said that the chief of police had acted against his advice.
On the day of Pal’s arrest, Minister Ahmed told a meeting of donor countries that there was complete press freedom in Bangladesh and that journalists in the country had been killed or attacked for reasons that were unconnected to their work. Donor country representatives had asked the Dhaka government to take action to improve the situation, pointing out that there could be no press freedom in Bangladesh as long as journalists worked under duress.
