Amid the allegation of rights violation, Bangladesh on Monday conveyed its position and described steps taken so far for the implementation of specific provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) during a review dialogue in Geneva.

‘In our national report, we’ve made an effort to inform the committee about all our legal, administrative and other initiatives for implementation of specific provisions ICCPR,’ said Law Minister Anisul Huq in a statement, reports UNB.

The Law Ministry distributed the copy of the statement to the press.

He also tried to touch upon some of the advance questions the government had received from the UN Human Rights Committee earlier mentioning that the people of Bangladesh have always been respectful to human rights.

Minister Huq who is leading a high-powered delegation from Bangladesh said the government will continue to promote human rights education and awareness to progressively ingrain a culture of human rights in all spheres of society.

‘In our endeavour to establish a just society, we’ve always taken the international community, particularly the United Nations, as an essential partner. Our sincerity and commitment is evident in the fact that during the tenure of this government, we’ve twice been elected as member of Human Rights Council,’ he said.

Minister Huq said in their journey towards emancipation they have maintained transparency and goodwill.

‘During the tenure of this government, we’ve facilitated the visit of Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion, thought and Conscience and Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women. We’ve also taken initiatives to clear the backlog of our Periodic Reports to the Treaty Bodies starting with the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights,’ he added.

The UN Human Rights Committee in Geneva started reviewing the situations related to civil and political rights in Bangladesh at 8pm (Bangladesh time). The first day review session was continuing till filing the report at 9:50pm on Monday.

Questions related to alleged enforced disappearances, custodial deaths, excessive use of force, death penalty, killings of bloggers, enjoying impunity by some perpetrations, investigations into alleged killings were raised during the first day review which will continue till Tuesday.

The Committee members wanted to know what measures are taken by the government in addressing the concerns.

The UN Human Rights Committee monitors implementation by States of one of the main international human rights treaties, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

The Committee will also review situations in Serbia (March 7-8); Turkmenistan (March 8-9); Italy (March 9-10); Thailand (March 13 -14); Bosnia and Herzegovina (March 14-15), according to a message UNB received from Geneva.

The above countries are among the 169 States that have ratified the ICCPR and so are required to be reviewed regularly by the Committee of 18 international independent experts.

All the States parties are obliged to submit regular reports to the Committee on how the rights are being implemented.

The Committee examines each report and addresses its concerns and recommendations to the State party in the form of ‘concluding observations’.

Its members are independent human rights experts drawn from around the world who serve in their personal capacity and not as representatives of States parties.

The Committee’s concluding observations are an independent assessment of States’ compliance with their human rights obligations under the treaty.