The perils of politicizing justice for Bangladesh’s uniformed guardians
By M A Hossain
The recent decision by the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) to issue arrest warrants in enforced-disappearance cases has reignited a bitter national argument: accountability versus institutional survival. That tension is real and unavoidable. Yet in the rush to score legal and political points, Bangladesh risks trading durable justice for a spectacle that could hollow out the state’s capacity to keep citizens safe — and, paradoxically, open space for the very extremists the nation fears.
Two simple facts frame the danger. First, the tribunal has issued arrest warrants against some thirty people in two disappearance cases — a move that has understandably captured public attention. Second, the prosecution has been led publicly by Chief Prosecutor Md Tajul Islam, whose office filed the charges now under scrutiny. Those are procedural realities. But what follows is an analytical judgment about ends and means: accountability is a public good; recklessly dismantling the cohesion and public confidence of our security forces is not.
When command responsibility becomes collective guilt
The problem is structural, not merely personal. The cases stem from deeply troubling episodes of secret detention and disappearances in 2016 and the surrounding years. Amnesty International and other observers documented instances of unlawful detention that were a national scandal; those facts merit transparent investigation and, where appropriate, prosecution. But there is a difference between targeted prosecution based on individual culpability and broad-brush indictments that treat entire lines of command as guilty by tenure. The latter risks transforming a tribunal of justice into an instrument of political retribution.
The logic underlying these arrests — according to arguments circulating in legal and military circles — appears to rest on an organogram theory of responsibility: anyone who held a particular post in a given period is treated as having command responsibility for crimes committed in that unit. That is a dangerously blunt instrument. Command responsibility is a legitimate doctrine in international law, but it is not a mechanical rule that can be applied without granular proof of orders given, orders disobeyed, or deliberate concealment. A prosecutor who substitutes inference for proof is walking on perilous ground.
The political risks of a legal spectacle
That slippage matters because of the wider political context. Bangladesh is not immune to the regional trend of rising religious and political extremism after dramatic regime shifts. Credible security analyses warn that, amid recent upheavals, hardline groups are reconfiguring networks and testing gaps in the state’s capacity to respond. To weaken the armed forces and other disciplined services — after years when the police themselves were politically targeted — is to invite those groups to exploit the vacuum. The unintended consequence of sweeping, institution-wide prosecutions could therefore be an erosion of public security that benefits the very forces of disorder the nation should be holding accountable.
It is legitimate, indeed necessary, to interrogate whether these prosecutions are being pursued for the public interest or for narrower political ends. The appearance that a prosecutorial office is being used to delegitimize a professional corps must be confronted with facts and answered in the light of law, not conjecture. If prosecutions are motivated by a desire to politically neuter the armed forces — an accusation many citizens and serving officers now voice — the remedy is not retaliation; it is institutional repair and impartial adjudication. But first, Bangladesh must demand rigorous standards of proof, transparency in evidence, and a careful delineation of individual responsibility.
Justice demands precision, not procedural haste
A second tactical error is procedural haste. The justice system, already strained, will be judged by its ability to separate fact from faction. A tribunal that issues mass warrants on the basis of position rather than probative evidence risks losing legitimacy — and with it, the moral authority to punish genuine wrongdoing. That outcome would be a tragedy both for victims and for the rule of law itself.
What, then, is the responsible way forward? First, prioritize focused, transparent investigations that identify direct perpetrators and the chain of decision-making. Prosecutions should be narrowly tailored to individuals whose actions can be connected to orders, cover-ups, or participation in unlawful detention and torture. Broad, tenure-based blame does a disservice to victims by obscuring who did what and why. Second, respect procedural safeguards enshrined in domestic law and the Constitution — including those governing military discipline and investigating serving officers.
Where institutional jurisdictions overlap, coordination mechanisms must ensure that military justice and civilian tribunals complement rather than contradict one another.
Third, maintain clarity that accountability is not synonymous with institutional dismantling. The armed forces, if found culpable at the individual level, must be reformed; but they must not be delegitimized wholesale in ways that damage national security.
The defamation of a national institution
The recent spate of graffiti defaming senior Bangladesh Army generals accused in ICT cases represents a deeply troubling escalation in the politicization of justice. Such acts are not expressions of free speech but calculated attempts to humiliate a national institution that has, for decades, stood as the bulwark of Bangladesh’s sovereignty, disaster response, and global peacekeeping reputation.
To target the Army through street slander is to undermine the morale of thousands of disciplined officers and soldiers who sacrifice daily to secure the nation’s borders and its people. This kind of smear campaign erodes public trust, emboldens adversarial forces, and risks turning legitimate debate over accountability into a weapon of psychological warfare against the country’s own defenders. In any democracy, criticism must not cross the line into defamation — especially when it damages the credibility of an institution so integral to national unity and stability.
Balancing justice with national security
Finally, the political class and civil society have a duty to resist the instrumentalization of justice. Prosecutors, judges, and opinion-makers must recognize that the erosion of a professional, disciplined armed force is not a tactical victory even for their opponents; it is a strategic loss for the nation. If the aim is to strengthen democracy and the rule of law, prosecutions should build institutions — strengthening investigations, ensuring fair trials, and protecting the rights of the accused — rather than reducing state capacity.
There are, to be sure, hard moral questions.
Families of the disappeared deserve answers, and those responsible must be brought before impartial courts. But justice delivered as theater, with the unstated objective of dismantling the military’s leadership, is an exceedingly dangerous experiment. It risks replacing one form of insecurity with another: the chaos that follows institutional collapse is fertile ground for extremist actors and criminal networks.
If Bangladesh is to be both just and secure, it must do three things at once: pursue individual accountability where evidence supports it; protect the institutional integrity of its security forces where their service is legitimate; and guard against political actors who would weaponize the law to settle scores. The path is narrow and exacting, but the alternative — a weakened state and a population less safe for it — is unacceptable.
Those who genuinely care for Bangladesh’s future should be prepared to insist on both justice and stability.
They should demand prosecutions that are precise, evidence-based, and blind to partisan winds. And they should oppose any rush to weaken the uniformed guardians without first separating criminal culpability from institutional function. Only then can the nation fulfill its dual promise: accountability for abuses, and security for every family who calls Bangladesh home.
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