New York, May 16 A leading international press freedom group called on Bangladeshi authorities to release journalists Farzana Rupa and Mozammel Babu, who were recently arrested in a crimes-against-humanity case filed at the country’s International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) urging them to stop using the tribunal as a tool against journalists.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) urged the authorities to stop using the tribunal as a tool to target media professionals.
The appeal came after the ICT on May 14 ordered journalists Farzana Rupa and Mozammel Babu, along with former minister Dipu Moni, to be shown arrested in a case linked to the 2013 crackdown on the Hefazat-e-Islam rally at Shapla Chattar in Dhaka.
The bench headed by Justice Md Golam Mortuza Mozumder reportedly issued the order, sending the accused to jail in connection with the case, while setting June 7 as the date for submission of the investigation report.
According to the CPJ, prosecutors alleged that Rupa, in a report aired on Bangladeshi media outlet Ekattor TV following the incident, used statements from “controversial individuals” and disseminated "misleading information" that diverted attention from killings during the crackdown.
Additionally, Babu, as managing director of the channel at the time, is accused of overseeing the broadcast as part of what the chief prosecutor described as a "systematic" effort to conceal the death toll.
The CPJ noted that it could not independently verify the Ekattor TV broadcasts aired before, during, and after the Shapla Chattar operation that the prosecution cites as evidence.
“Editorial decisions on covering a contested political incident are not crimes against humanity, and using an international criminal law framework to punish journalists circumvents the basic protections guaranteed to the press under Bangladesh’s own constitution while also violating international human rights conventions,” said CPJ Asia-Pacific Program Coordinator Kunal Majumder.
“Bangladeshi authorities must stop weaponising the international criminal tribunal to target journalists and immediately release Farzana Rupa and Mozammel Babu,” he added.
The organisation highlighted that Rupa and Babu have been held in pre-trial detention since August and September 2024, respectively, in connection with separate murder cases linked to deaths during the July 2024 protests that ousted the Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League government.
On May 11, the High Court in Dhaka granted Rupa ad-interim bail in six of those cases, but she remains in jail because of pending charges, including the ICT case.
The ICT was originally constituted in 2010 during the tenure of the Awami League government to try crimes committed during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War against Pakistan.
Following the political transition of August 2024, the CPJ said that the former Muhammad Yunus-led interim government had reconstituted the tribunal and amended the law to prosecute figures linked to the Awami League government, including Hasina, who was sentenced to death in absentia in November 2025.
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