© COPYRIGHT by Nicole Longobardo 2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED For my parents, to whom I owe so much. THE SPOILS OF WAR: TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE IN BANGLADESH BY Nicole Longobardo ABSTRACT In 2009, Bangladesh’s Awami League began a process to try ‘collaborators’ for their alleged crimes during the 1971 Liberation War. This single case study approach focuses on the nearly forty years between 1971 and 2009 in an attempt to understand why transitional justice was delayed and why prosecutions were chosen over other mechanism (i.e. truth commission, lustrations, etc.). It suggests that the decision of when and how to implement justice in the aftermath of violent conflict is based upon political elements – parties, actors, international organizations – thereby supporting an already well-understood dynamic of post-conflict reconstruction. This research, therefore, examines four factors were critical in shaping the timing and structure of transitional justice in Bangladesh: (1) the availability of a peace agreement; (2) involvement of regional and international community actors; (3) culpability of decision makers/political elites; and (4) domestic political stability. ii ACKNOWLEGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to thank the two people who made this all possible: my mom and dad. My parents have supported me both financially and emotionally throughout this process and so many others. I could not have asked for a better support system throughout my academic career. To my dad, I would like to thank you for your service as a law enforcement officer that spanned over three decades. I can remember so clearly riding with you in a squad car when I was so small looking at you and knowing you were (and still very much are) my hero. From you, I developed a passion for justice and peace that has led me to where I am today. For me, you are the best example of what is means to be a peace officer and I will never forget what that has meant in shaping my character. To my mom, thank you for always being my number one fan and for never failing to listen to all my worries, complaints and all of life’s woes. The values you have instilled in me have guided my every step on this path of life. Your whole life has been dedicated to furthering mine and I hope you know how aware I am of all the sacrifices you have made to give me what you were never able to have. You have been and will always be my mom and my best friend. I would also like to thank my better half, Luca, for never ceasing to support me throughout my graduate career. Thank you for always putting a smile on my face and for giving me a boost of confidence when I needed it the most. I cannot imagine not having you with me throughout this journey. Thank you so much for sharing it with me. Finally, I would like to thank my committee, Dr. Jeff Bachman and Dr. Aaron Boesenecker. I could not have asked for two better professors to guide me through this process. Thank you for constantly pushing me to be a better researcher and for always believing in me and this project. I will forever be grateful to the both of you for all that you have taught me. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT………………………………………………………………………ii ACKNOWLEGEMENTS………………………………………………………..iii LIST OF TABLES…………………………………………………………...........v LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS………………………………………………..........vi Chapter 1. INTRODUCTION……………………………………………….........1 2. LITERATURE REVIEW………………………………………..........9 3. METHODOLOGICAL PLAN……………………………………….44 4. THE QUEST FOR JUSTICE……………………………………………………………..56 5. THE BEGINNING OF MILITARY RULE………………………………………………………………...79 6. AUTHORITARIANISM AND THE QUEST FOR DEMOCRACY………………………………….........93 7. DEMOCRACY AND JUSTICE IN A NEW ERA……………………………………………………109 8. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION…………………………..........136 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………143 iv TABLES 1.1 Summary of findings from 1971 – 2009………………………………….142 v ILLUSTRATIONS Figures 1. Bell-curve showing political instability 125 during the democratic period, 1991 – 2009. vi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION “The privilege of opening the first trial in history for crimes against the peace of the world imposes a grave responsibility. The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated.”1 With these words, Robert H. Jackson, chief United States prosecutor, opened the landmark Nuremberg Trials in 1945 to put on trial and to punish Nazi war criminals for their part in the extermination of more than ten million people. The trials were the first time an international body, comprised of representatives from the allied forces, would attempt to hold individuals suspected of war crimes and other egregious violations of human rights. The Nuremberg Trials would be a watershed event in the history of international law and judicial procedure. It set the precedent for addressing the next half-century of mass atrocities and violent conflict, a process that would come to be known as transitional justice. The Nuremberg Trials, however, would not succeed in deterring further acts of violence and mass genocide. The next century would witness an onslaught of mass violence all over the world. While Nuremberg set the precedent, the states emerging from such violence had varying experiences with transitional justice. Some transitions were characterized by an international tribunal administered largely by the UN, while others took on the form of a hybrid tribunal utilizing both domestic and international resources while still others chose to prosecute alleged criminals within their domestic jurisdiction. Additionally, implementing transitional justice occurred at varying points of the transition. In some cases, transitional justice was implemented in the immediate aftermath of hostilities while other mechanisms were not implemented until 1 Robert H. Jackson, “Opening Statement Nuremberg Trials, 1945” (November 21, 1945), available at http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/personality/sources_document12.html. 1 years or decades after the alleged crimes were committed. It is important to delineate how and when these states answered the call for justice in order to situate Bangladesh among these other cases. In Guatemala for instance, anti-Communist forces enacted a violent campaign to combat leftist opponents from 1962 to 1996. A UN-brokered peace agreement in 1996 established a truth commission, the Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH), which produced a report of its findings in 1999. It concluded that this “‘criminal counterinsurgency’ perpetrated 626 individual massacres, and killed over 200,000 people, ‘the vast majority’ of whom were Guatemalan civilians, one-quarter of them women.”2 This was in addition to the approximately 50,000 reported disappearances. Seven years later, in 2006, the UN and the Government of Guatemala signed the Agreement to Establish the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala to strengthen the prosecution of criminal groups that arose out of the formal military regime.3 More recently, in February 2012, the Guatemala court charged General Efrain Rios Montt, former dictator, with genocide and crimes against humanity.4 In another instance, Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge implemented a brutal campaign against its citizens, murdering approximately twenty percent of the 1975 population of 7.3 to 7.9 million people.5 The atrocities began in 1975 and would not cease until 1979 when the Khmer Rouge 2 Ben Kiernan, Blood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 582. 3 “Background: Justice Delayed,” under “Guatemala,” International Center for Transitional Justice (2014), available at http://ictj.org/our-work/regions-and-countries/guatemala. 4 Laura Carlsen, “Genocide on Trial in Guatemala,” The Nation (February 29, 2012), available at http://www.thenation.com/article/166526/genocide-trial-guatemala#. 5 Estimates for the number of people kill differ among various sources. The Vietnamese argue that the total number is between three to four million whereas historians arrive at anything between 1.5 and 1.7 million. According to Steven Ratner and Jason Abrams, the estimates point to a death rate of twenty percent of the population. See Jason Abrams and Steven Ratner, Accountability for Human Rights Atrocities in International Law, second edition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 276. 2 was ousted by neighboring Vietnam. The UN-brokered Paris Agreement was signed in 1991 establishing the UN Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC); however, the UN was not given the authority to try or punish for atrocities of the 1970s nor did it require the future Cambodia government to implement any such mechanism. After careful persuasion, the government of Cambodia formally requested UN assistance in 1997 to implement proceedings for holding Khmer Rouge leaders accountable.6 Eventually a hybrid tribunal – a Cambodian court with significant UN participation – was implemented under the name the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC).7 It would take another ten years for the ECCC to enter pre-trial stages and as of 2011, the courts were still hearing cases three decades after the Khmer Rouge was overthrown. As Cambodia prepared to repair its broken society in 1979, a ruthless dictator came to power in Iraq; Saddam Hussein took control of his ruling Ba’ath party effectively becoming the president of Iraq. The next 27 years of brutality would come to define his rule and would eventually lead to one of the most recent transitional justice processes. “Torture, extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detentions, and enforced disappearances were common.”8 Approximately 300,000 Iraqis disappeared during his rule in addition to the 100,000 Kurds who are believed to have been executed from February to September 1988. In the south, an estimated half a million people were expelled to Iran and 50,000 to 70,000 people were imprisoned or disappeared.9 The regime was toppled after the US-led invasion in 2003, an event that provided an opportunity for 6 Ibid 280.