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NEW YORK (Mar. 18, 2006) - A member of the
Hindu American Foundation’s (HAF) Executive Council
addressed the “Sixth International Conference on Religious
& Ethnic Cleansing and Terrorism in Bangladesh: The Role
of Govt. and Civil Society,” a conference organized
by the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist & Christian Unity Council
(BHBUC) USA on February 26, 2006, in New York.
Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-FL,
was the keynote speaker. Other notable speakers included Subrata
Choudhury of the Bangladesh Supreme Court Bar Association;
Saleem Samad, journalist and former Bangladesh Bureau chief
of TIME-ASIA Magazine; and Dr. Sachi Dastidar, former chair,
Department of Politics, Economics and Society, State University
of New York.
“The failure
of the Bangladesh Government to end the atrocities on
minorities and the dangers to the region as well as
the world from rising Islamic fundamentalism in Bangladesh
are a cause for concern,” cautioned Swaminathan
Venkataraman, one of HAF’s Executive Council members,
in his address to the conference. “It is high
time that the moral weight of the US Congress is brought
to bear upon this issue,” he said. Discussing
the Congressional Research Service’s report on
Bangladesh, Ros-Lehtinen spoke at length about the human
rights violations and ethnic cleansing that has been
visited upon the minorities of Bangladesh. “Hindus
have a history of being peaceful, pluralistic and understanding
of other faiths and peoples, yet minority Hindus have
endured decades of pain and suffering without the attention
of the world”, she said. |
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From Left to Right: Dr. Jiten Roy (BHBCUC);
Dr. Dwijen Bhattacharjya (Spokesperson (BHBCUC); Mr.
Swaminathan Venkataraman (HAF; Mr. Bidyut Sarkar (BHBCUC);
Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen; Mr. Saleem Samad,
formerly with TIME-ASIA (living in exile); Captain Sachin
Karmakar (living in exile); and Mr. Shontosh Shaha (BHBUC) |
In October 2005, HAF submitted a draft resolution
that would call attention to the significant human rights
violations occurring against Hindu minorities in Bangladesh,
among other regions, to Ros-Lehtinen. Venkataraman urged her
to finalize a resolution for submission to the US Congress
and called for a statement of strong condemnation of the atrocities
against Hindu minorities in Bangladesh, Pakistan, the Indian
state of Jammu-Kashmir and elsewhere, to be released onto
the House floor.
Venkataraman thanked Ros-Lehtinen for endorsing
HAF’s first annual report on the status of Hindu human
rights in Bangladesh, Pakistan and the Indian state of Jammu
and Kashmir released in July 2005. Entitled “Hindus
in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Kashmir: A survey of Human Rights
2004”, the report compiles media coverage and first-hand
accounts of human rights violations perpetrated against Hindus
because of their religious identity. The full text of the
first annual HAF Hindu human rights report is available at
http://www.hinduamericanfoundation.org/HHR2004.pdf
The Hindu American Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3), non-partisan organization, promoting the Hindu
and American ideals of understanding, tolerance and pluralism.
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