Chittagong Hill Tracts conflict

The Chittagong Hill Tracts conflict was the political conflict and armed struggle between the Government of Bangladesh and the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samiti (United People's Party of the Chittagong Hill Tracts) and its armed wing, the Shanti Bahini, over the issue of autonomy and the rights of the Buddhist and Hindu Jumma people, Chakma people and tribes of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. The Shanti Bahini launched an insurgency against government forces in 1977, when the country was under military rule, and the conflict continued for twenty years until the government and the PCJSS signed the Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Accord in 1997.

The actions carried out by the armed forces and the paramilitary groups helping them have been described internationally as genocide and ethnic cleansing. And there have been reports of mass rapes by the militias, known as Ansars, which has been described as "genocide by other means" by Mark Levene and he has compared these attacks to the mass rapes during the Bangladesh Liberation War.

According to Amnesty International as of June 2013 the Bangladeshi government had still not honored the terms of the peace accord nor addressed the Jumma peoples concerns over the return of their land. Amnesty estimate that there are currently 90,000 internally displaced Jumma families.

Background

The conflict in the Chittagong Hill Tracts dates back to when Bangladesh was the eastern wing of Pakistan. Widespread resentment occurred over the displacement of as many as 100,000 of the native peoples due to the construction of the Kaptai Dam in 1962. The displaced did not receive compensation from the government and many thousands fled to India. After the creation of Bangladesh in 1971, representatives of the Chittagong Hill Tracts such as the Buddhist Chakma politician Manabendra Narayan Larma sought autonomy and recognition of the rights of the peoples of the region. Larma and other Hill Tracts representatives protested the draft of the Constitution of Bangladesh, which did not recognise the ethnic identity and culture of the non-Muslim, non-Bengali peoples of Bangladesh. The government policy recognised only the Bengali culture and the Bengali language and designating all citizens of Bangladesh as Bengalis. In talks with a Hill Tracts delegation led by Manabendra Narayan Larma, the country's founding leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman insisted that the ethnic groups of the Hill Tracts adopt the Bengali identity. Sheikh Mujib is also reported to have threatened to forcibly settle Muslim Bengalis in the Hill Tracts to reduce the native Buddhist and Hindu peoples into a minority.

Insurgency

Consequently, Larma and others founded the Parbatya Chhatagram Jana Shanghatti Samiti (PCJSS) as a united political organisation of all native peoples and tribes in 1973. The armed wing of the PCJSS, the Shanti Bahini was organised to resist government policies. The crisis aggravated during the emergency rule of Sheikh Mujib, who had banned all political parties other than his BAKSAL and the successive military regimes that followed after his assassination in 1975. In 1977, the Shanti Bahini launched their first attack on a Bangladesh Army convoy. The Indian government helped the Shanti Bahini set up bases across the border from Bangladesh.

The Shanti Bahini divided its area of operations into zones and raised forces from the native people, who were formally trained. The Shanti Bahini attacked Bengali police and soldiers, government offices and personnel and the Bengali settlers in the region. The group also attacked any native believed to be opposing it and supporting the government. According to government sources between 1980 to 1991, 1,180 people were killed by the Shanti Bahini, and 582 were kidnapped. Most of those killed were Bengali settlers. The Bangladesh Armed Forces, Bangladesh Police, Bengali settlers, the Shanti Bahini and its supporters have been accused of committing human rights abuses including ethnic cleansing.

Human rights abuses against the Jumma

Sculpture Glorifying Bangladesh Military at Bandarban Hill tracts

Flag of Shanti Bahini

Bangladesh was under military rule for fifteen years and democracy was restored in 1990. During this period there were several massacres of Rakhine peoples in the CHT, the main perpetrators of these acts of mass violence are the Bangladesh armed forces and settlers who have been armed by the Bangladeshi government. In 1980 Bengalis and members of the armed forces attacked the village of Kaukjali which left 300 dead. Another massacre occurred on 3 March when the security forces killed between 3000 and 4000 people, on 25 March 1981 settlers and members of the armed forces attacked and killed 500 people in Matiranga, in 1986 in Panchari, in 1989 in Longudu which left 40 indigenous peoples dead and displaced a further 13,000 who took refuge in India., 1992 in Logang which caused the deaths of hundreds of people with reports that hundreds had been burned alive and others shot dead while trying to escape, the incident led to the EU passing a resolution requesting that Bangladesh put a halt to continued use of the military in the CHT. and the Naniachar massacre in 1993 which led to 100 people being killed after a student demonstration was attacked by settlers and members of the armed forces. The UN special rapporteur has reported on extrajudicial, arbitrary and summary executions and that he had received reports of numerous human rights violations.

Between 1971 and 1994 it is estimated that 2500 Jumma women had been raped and in 1995 it was estimated that of over 94 per cent of rapes between 1991 and 1993 had been by the armed forces, with allegations that 40 per cent of those raped were minors. Between 2003 and 2007 27 per cent of rapes were committed by the armed forces with the remaining having been committed by Bengali settlers. According to Kabita Chakma and Glen Hill the sexual abuse against Jumma women is endemic. During the conflict, the Bangladeshi state had used as a deliberate tactic, rape, torture, arbitrary arrests, mass imprisonment and kidnapping against the Jumma peoples to combat the insurgency.

The accords of the peace treaty have yet to be fully implemented which has resulted in the region remaining heavily militarized and mass inward migration continuing. Human rights violations continue with arbitrary arrests, killing and rapes occurring and human rights activists are targeted for questioning and arrests. According to a report from the Asian Centre for Human Rights on 26 August 2003 the armed forces in conjunction with settlers planned and launched an attack on ten villages. Hundreds of people were displaced and it is estimated that ten women, some who were minors were raped. It was reported that a nine-month-old child was strangled after it was grabbed from its grandmother who the armed forces raped.

As yet the Jumma peoples have not been given constitutional recognition and are known as “backward segments of the population”

Government reaction

A map of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.

At the outbreak of the insurgency, the Government of Bangladesh deployed the army to begin counter-insurgency operations. The then-President of Bangladesh Ziaur Rahman created a Chittagong Hill Tracts Development Board under an army general in order to address the socio-economic needs of the region, but the entity proved unpopular and became a source of antagonism and mistrust amongst the native people against the government. The government failed to address the long-standing issue of the displacement of people, numbering an estimated 100,000 caused by the construction of the Kaptai Dam in 1962. Displaced peoples did not receive compensation and more than 40,000 Chakma tribals had fled to India. In the 1980s, the government began settling Bengalis in the region, causing the eviction of many natives and a significant alteration of demographics. Having constituted only 11.6% of the regional population in 1974, the number of Bengalis grew by 1991 to constitute 48.5% of the regional population.

In 1989, the government of then-president Hossain Mohammad Ershad passed the District Council Act created three tiers of local government councils to devolve powers and responsibilities to the representatives of the native peoples, but the councils were rejected and opposed by the PCJSS.

Peace accord

Main article: Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Accord

Peace negotiations were initiated after the restoration of democracy in Bangladesh in 1991, but little progress was made with the government of Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia, the widow of Ziaur Rahman and her Bangladesh Nationalist Party. Fresh rounds of talks began in 1996 with the newly elected prime minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed of the Awami League, the daughter of Sheikh Mujib. The peace accord was finalised and formally signed on December 2, 1997.

The agreement recognised the special status of the hill residents.

See also

• Chittagong Hill Tracts manual
• Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Accord
• Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samiti

External links

• Full text of Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Accord
• Politics of Peace: A Case of the Chittagong Hill Tracts edited by Nasir Uddin