No fewer than 32 children have died during student protests that engulfed Bangladesh last month, the UN’s children’s agency has said.
According to a spokeswoman for UNICEF, the youngest child slain was under the age of five, and the majority of those who perished were spectators.
According to BBC Bangla, more than 200 people were killed amid demonstrations against civil service employment quotas.
The government has reduced the quota system in response to a Supreme Court order, but students have continued to demonstrate, demanding justice for those who died, were injured, or were incarcerated.
While the demonstrations are now smaller in scale, the government is struggling to control the rising tide of anger over how it initially responded to the demonstrations.
“Why are our brothers in graves and the killers outside?” asked a crowd that had gathered outside the largest mosque in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, following Friday prayers, according to the AFP news agency.
According to Reuters, security personnel used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse the thousands of people who had gathered in the streets. It stated that at least 20 persons were hurt.
Sanjay Wijesekera, UNICEF’s regional director for South Asia, confirmed that he had been informed of instances of children being imprisoned during a visit to Bangladesh this week.
He went on to say that the 32 deaths reported by the agency were “a terrible loss.”.
According to a spokesperson for the UN Agency, the majority of those slain were 13 or older, with one youngster under the age of five and one aged six to twelve.
“Children must be protected at all times,” Mr. Wijesekera said. “That is everyone’s responsibility.”
Bangladeshi junior information minister Mohammad Ali Arafat responded, saying the government has no knowledge of UNICEF’s mortality toll.
“We don’t know where they [UNICEF] got the numbers from,” he told the BBC, adding: “Our position is clear: Whoever has been killed, we are going to investigate and bring the perpetrators to book.”
Security forces were accused of using disproportionate force to disperse the early rallies, with many of the dead and injured suffering from gunshot wounds, according to doctors who talked with the BBC.
However, the administration has blamed the disturbance on political opponents, claiming that a number of police personnel were killed as well.
On Thursday, it outlawed the country’s major Islamist party, Jamaat-e-Islami, as well as its student branch, Islami Chhatra Shibir, alleging that they were responsible for some of the violence.
“We have evidence that they have participated in the killings and in the destruction of government and private properties,” Anisul Huq, Bagladesh’s law minister, told the BBC.
