Rights watchdog calls for probe into Indian border killings

New York-based Human Rights Watch called for India to investigate claims of killings, torture and other abuses by the Border Security Force (BSF) policing India's border with Bangladesh.

"The government of India should undertake a speedy, fair, and transparent criminal investigation into fresh allegations of killings, torture, and other abuses," the rights watchdog said in a press release Monday. "Those against whom there is credible evidence of culpability should be prosecuted as part of an effort to end longstanding impunity for abuses along the border."

In December 2010, a Human Rights Watch report documented extrajudicial killings, arbitrary detention, torture, and ill-treatment by the BSF, accusing the BSF of killing both Indian and Bangladeshi citizens over the past decade. Authorities on both sides of the border assured the rights watchdog that the abuses would stop.

However, while the number of deaths due to shooting has substantially decreased in 2011, the Bangladeshi non-governmental organization Odhikar has documented at least 17 alleged killings of Bangladeshis by the border force and other instances of severe abuse since January, the HRW press release said. Local groups have documented several cases of deaths as a result of severe beatings by the BSF.