Government bans land issues workshop

The government of Bangladesh sent police to break up a workshop held to discuss land rights issues in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT). The workshop was to discuss the implementation of the 1997 peace accords signed between the Jumma tribal peoples and the government, and was organised with the support of the Danish Embassy in Bangladesh.

The right to land is one of the crucial issues addressed in the peace accords. Thousands of Bengali settlers have been moved onto the Jummas' land in the last fifty years, resulting in displacement of the Jummas and violent repression by the military. The situation has improved since the peace accords, but the Jummas still experience violence and theft of their land.