STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Over more than a decade, hundreds of men in Bangladesh disappeared without a trace. Many belonged to a party that opposed the former prime minister, Sheikh Hasina. Her autocratic rule of Bangladesh ended last month when she was forced to flee the country. Now, as NPR's Diaa Hadid reports, families of the missing men want answers.
DIAA HADID, BYLINE: You're holding up a picture of someone who looks like a young man. Who is that person?
KUMARA FIHI: He is my father. I am looking for my father since 14 years.
HADID: Kumara Fihi is one of dozens of protesters in downtown Dhaka. They're here to demand answers about the men who disappeared during Sheikh Hasina's 15-year rule. Human rights groups count some 600 people who disappeared during Sheikh Hasina's time. Activists say the real number is likely far more. Many of the men who disappeared ultimately reappeared, often dumped blindfolded on roadsides, too terrorized to talk. But dozens remain unaccounted for, like Fihi's father. She hopes he's alive, but...
FIHI: If he died, please inform us.
HADID: Fihi says her mother has lived in a fog of sadness for years.
FIHI: This has destroyed our happy family. This has destroyed our life.
HADID: Families of the missing widely accuse a paramilitary force called the Rapid Action Battalion of being behind the disappearances of their loved ones. That force was answerable to Sheikh Hasina. And three years ago, the State Department even sanctioned them over their alleged human rights violations. The former government, though, has long denied it was responsible. In 2018, the minister of security told media that the disappeared probably fled bad debts.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: "Or maybe they'd quarreled with their wives," he said, "or ran away with their mistresses."
Now, the new government, led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, says it is taking these families seriously. On a recent night, we met a delegation of families waiting to sit with Yunus. Mothers held pictures of their missing sons. Their daughters held their hands. Yunus walks into the room to meet the families.
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HADID: He sits with a mother. She bursts into tears.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Crying).
HADID: We're ushered out so families have time to grieve with Bangladesh's new leader. Shortly afterwards, the government announced an official investigation into the fates of the disappeared. These few weeks have been an emotional roller coaster. A couple of days after Sheikh Hasina fled the country, two men who'd been missing for years reappeared. They said they'd been kept in an underground prison. One of them spoke to media shortly after his release. His name is Mir Ahmad bin Quasem.
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MIR AHMAD BIN QUASEM: (Crying) I gave up hope of mine. I gave up my hope to see them, but they didn't. They knew I'll come back.
HADID: That gave families real hope that their loved ones, too, might be found alive. There's been no official word so far on their fates, but on social media, some families are hearing the worst. Like Sanjida Islam Tuli - her brother, who belonged to Hasina's rival party, disappeared alongside five men in 2013. Tuli coordinates a group for families of the disappeared. When I called her to check in, she tells me her brother, Sajedul Islam Sumon, is dead. We race over. Mourners file into her house. A young relative, Afrin Joon, sits with me.
AFRIN JOON: Today, we came to know that he's no more.
HADID: How did you come to know that?
JOON: A Facebook post.
HADID: A Facebook post?
JOON: Yes.
HADID: She says it was a detailed status update from an exiled journalist. Days later, I meet Sanjida Tuli again.
SANJIDA ISLAM TULI: (Non-English language spoken).
HADID: She says the Facebook post announcing her brother's death devastated them. But without official confirmation...
TULI: We don't know how to accept it.
HADID: Tuli switches to Bengali and says, "my mother has broken down."
TULI: (Speaking Bengali).
HADID: Producer Ahmede Hussain translates.
AHMEDE HUSSAIN, BYLINE: She cannot accept it. At the same time, she cannot deny the fact that something might have happened to him.
HADID: Tuli says, when Sheikh Hasina was ruling Bangladesh, she had hope that she'd be ousted, and her brother would return. So her heart swelled when Sheikh Hasina fled the country in August.
TULI: I was happy.
HADID: The prisons would open, and...
TULI: I will find my brother.
HADID: But Tuli says, if anything, her family's pain is more acute now because Sheikh Hasina is gone, but Tuli doesn't know if she's any closer to knowing her brother's fate.
Diaa Hadid, NPR News, Dhaka.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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