BSS photo Bangladesh High Commissioner to the United Kingdom (UK) Saida Muna Tasneem has called for a fresh motion in the British Parliament to recognize the 1971 genocide, recalling the early day motion ‘stopping the genocide in East Bengal and recognising Bangladesh’ adopted at the British Parliament in June 1971.
“There is strong documentary and eyewitness evidence that genocide was committed on Bangladesh soil in 1971, yet the world has failed to recognise it,” she said in her welcome address at a high-profile commemorative event at the British Parliament on Bangladesh Genocide Day 2024 hosted by the Bangladesh High Commission in London on Monday.
According to a message received on Tuesday, senior British parliamentarians, eminent academics, legal experts, freedom fighters and community leaders participated in the commemorative events titled ‘Remembering the Bangladesh Genocide 1971: The Road to International Recognition’.
Tasneem cited several international media reports on the Bengali Genocide, including Anthony Mascarenhas's lead article in The Sunday Times headlined ‘Genocide’ and similar reports on mass atrocities by The Telegraph and BBC that shocked the world and prompted global leaders to act.
The high commissioner commended the US Congress resolution led by Congressman Ro Khanna and Congressman Steve Chabot, which needs to be emulated in the British parliament.
Professor of International Law and Human Rights of the University of Birmingham, Professor Mohammad Shahabuddin, said that the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh by the Pakistan army
fulfilled all criteria to be recognised by the UN.
Organiser of the Bangladesh Liberation War Overseas Freedom Movement in the UK, Sultan Mahmud Sharif, Freedom Fighter and Study Circle Chair Syed Mozammel Ali, Patron of Oxfam
UK Azizur Rahman, President of Sammmilito Sangskirtik Jote UK Golam Mostafa and Director of the Swadhinata Trust Ansar Ahmad Ullah also spoke on the occasion.
One minute of silence was observed at the event to commemorate the ‘Black Night’ of 25 March 1971.
