We, the undersigned international human rights organizations, strongly urge the Government of Bangladesh to enact the National Human Rights Commission Ordinance 2025 and the Enforced Disappearance Prevention and Remedy Ordinance 2025, which are set to lapse if not promptly passed by Parliament. Following the February 2026 national elections, the new Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP)-led government has the critical opportunity to institutionalize a robust National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) as a bulwark against future abuses and backsliding. However, we are deeply concerned that the government has proposed allowing the ordinances to lapse and introducing them as new bills in Parliament sometime in the future. Such action would effectively eliminate the revitalized NHRC, with five newly-appointed commissioners, which now has strengthened authority and independence to investigate abuses and guard against impunity.
Four ordinances adopted by the Interim Government-the NHRC Ordinance 2025, its Amendment Ordinance 2025, the Enforced Disappearance Ordinance 2025, and its Amendment Ordinance 2026-jointly provide a framework that has rebuilt the NHRC, with significant progress towards adherence to the Paris Principles and implementation of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. If the ordinances are not passed soon, the law will revert to the NHRC Act 2009, under which the NHRC was toothless and ineffective in addressing human rights violations, including by security forces. Among the critical improvements to the revitalized NHRC are its expanded mandate to investigate abuses by security forces and to monitor detention sites per the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture, improved institutional independence, and greater protections for commissioners against removal. As noted in a joint letter by international civil society, a strong and independent NHRC is essential to investigate cases and prevent future abuses.
The Enforced Disappearance Ordinance 2025 empowers the NHRC to investigate disappearances, building on the efforts of the Interim Government's Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances (COIED). The COIED documented the systemic perpetration of disappearances and torture by security forces, receiving 1,569 complaints of disappearances and documenting 287 victims who remain missing. Critically, the ordinances establish enforced disappearance as a distinct crime under Bangladesh law for the first time and provide remedies for victims and their families.
The Paris Principles, which set out international standards for national human rights institutions, require that the NHRC should be independent of the government. As such, it should not be under the oversight of any government ministry. The existing ordinance provides an improved basis for the institution's transparency and accountability as an independent body. The NHRC needs to remain empowered to open investigations as it deems necessary. A requirement to seek government "permission" to investigate the security forces, for instance, would entirely undermine its independence. For the same reason it is vital that government representatives do not dominate the committee for selecting commissioners.
Though the ordinances have produced key human rights reforms, there is a serious risk that such progress will be lost if the ordinances are not passed by the new government. Rather than allowing the ordinances to lapse, any amendments by the government should be made to the current ordinances and serve only to bring them further in line with international standards, including the Paris Principles, and remove the death penalty as a punishment from the Enforced Disappearance Ordinance 2025. The BNP-led government now faces a major litmus test only six weeks after taking office: it should pass the ordinances without weakening them in order to break with the past and demonstrate its commitment to pursuing a rights-respecting future.
Signed by:
ARTICLE 19
CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation
Fortify Rights
Human Rights Watch
International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH)
Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center
Tech Global Institute
United Against Torture Consortium (UATC), through its following members:
Association for the Prevention of Torture (APT)
International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT)
Omega Research Foundation
Redress
World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)
