Bangladesh minister defends government’s response to protests amid calls for investigation | Protest news

Bangladesh’s minister of state for information and broadcasting defended the government’s handling of mass protests, while United Nations experts called for an independent investigation into the government’s deadly crackdown on protesters.

In an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera on Thursday, Mohammad Arafat said the country’s security forces did everything “to bring back peace” amid the student protests.

He accused “third party” actors, including “extremists and terrorists,” of fueling the unrest.

“We are not referring to students [as] terrorists and anarchists. They are the third parties, those who meddled in this movement and started doing all this,” Arafat said in Talk to Al Jazeera.

“We tried our best to defuse the tension,” he said, adding that “some people are trying to add fuel to the fire, they are trying to create a situation where they can take advantage… and overthrow the government.”

Thousands of Bangladeshi students took to the streets earlier this month to demand reforms to the South Asian country’s quota system, which allocates 30 percent of government jobs to descendants of veterans who fought for Bangladesh in the 1971 war.

More than 150 student protesters were killed and thousands arrested in the crackdown on demonstrations, according to local media, fueling tensions across the country of more than 170 million people.

Protests turned violent on July 15 after members of the Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) – the student wing of the country’s ruling party – allegedly attacked protesters.

The police then repressed the demonstrations and imposed a curfew. Students were asked to vacate the universities, which were closed; businesses were closed and internet access was disrupted across the country.

The Bangladeshi government has come under international scrutiny for its handling of the protests.

On Thursday, the United Nations Human Rights Chief Volker Turk called for “an impartial, independent and transparent investigation into all alleged human rights violations” that occurred during the crackdown.

“We understand that many people were subjected to violent attacks by groups allegedly affiliated with the Government and no effort was made to protect them,” Turk said.

On a separate declarationa group of UN experts also called for an independent investigation into what they described as the government’s “violent crackdown on protesters”.

“The government is blaming other people, others are blaming the government; we need a completely impartial investigation,” one of the experts, Irene Khan, UN special rapporteur on freedom of expression and opinion, told Al Jazeera.

“But since there is no trust in the government, this has to be done with the international community,” Khan said on Thursday.

“We call on the government to invite the UN to conduct this investigation to find out what went wrong, to take responsibility and to hold the perpetrators accountable.”

Official death toll not yet determined: Minister

In his interview with Talk to Al JazeeraArafat – the minister – denounced the protesters for storming the headquarters of state broadcaster Bangladesh Television (BTV) in the capital, Dhaka.

He said that the police officers guarding the building were outnumbered and “because they were not allowed to open fire… those criminals entered BTV, literally invaded, set it on fire and began vandalizing and destroying all the property”.

Arafat said the government has not yet determined the official death toll from the unrest.

“When it comes to casualties, injuries and deaths, we are not willing to discriminate between the police and the general public, or between protesters, or between government supporters,” he said.

The minister told Al Jazeera that an independent judicial committee would ensure a full investigation into what happened, “so that all those responsible for any of these victims can be held accountable”.

Arafat also rejected any calls for Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to resign, adding that she was only “protecting the people”.

On Tuesday, protesters extended the suspension of their protests until Friday, but were scheduled to meet on Thursday to discuss whether to extend the pause further.

Among their main demands is the stipulation that Hasina must publicly apologize for the student killings.

They also asked Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan, Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader, Education Minister Mohibul Hasan Chowdhury Nowfel and Law Minister Anisul Haque to resign from the cabinet and the party.