Facing the 12th of February, and the upcoming elections since the Monsoon Revolution in 2024, Chief Advisor of the interim government Muhammed Yunus released a document which stated that of the 645 reported incidents affecting minority communities only 71 were caused by communal violence. The other 574 were linked to general criminal activity like theft, conflicts among neighbors, land conflicts, sexual violence and personal enmity. Even though Yunus promises total accountability of all the crimes committed, it is important to emphasis that when it comes to the violence itself, especially in the provinces like Chittagong Hill Tracts, the lines are often blurred.
This report is countered by other data and reports accumulated over the years. Like the report by the United States Commission of International Religion Freedom in July 2025 that openly stated “that the freedom of religious conditions was rapidly in decline”.
Or a report written by Genocide Watchi that the persecution of the indigenous people, collectively called the Jumma and which is comprised of twelve different ethnic groups in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, is still ongoing. The ethnic and communal violence here distinguish itself by destruction of shrines and temples, landgrabs of Hindu’s, lynching parties or the forced conversions of the Buddhist minorities Chakmas into the Islam. In 2020 889 sexual violence against Jumma women were reported. Or the more overtly cases where blasphemy laws played a role: like in October 2021 where in various places rioters demolished 80 different shrines and killed two people in the city of Commila after a depiction of the Quran bending a knee in front of a Hindu God Devi Durga.
Or last year alone on the 26th of July where 15 – 20 Hindu Houses were burned to the ground or the well documented killing of Dipu Chandra Das in Bhaluka on the 18th of December 2025 after he was accused of insulting the prophet Muhammad.
The Bengali government has been accused of “the denial of truth” when it comes to communal violence.
How can we make sense of these conflicting statements? And how can I contribute in this discussion as a genocide scholar?
What I will try to do today is explain, and hopefully thought provoke, how we can interpret this contradiction in data and link it to the volatile mix of identity politics, communal violence and blasphemy laws. And how this could lead to impunity and to a phenomenon and process called “creeping genocide”.
For there is a peculiar and unique element in Bangladesh, involving the central government and local authorities, which makes the crime of genocide invisible. As a matter of fact I will argue today that the blasphemy laws have an hiding and cloaking effect which strengthens this peculiar relationship between the central government and local authorities and increases the chance for impunity.
Let me first emphasize where genocide differs from other international crimes and this is the aim of genocide. Where genocide differs from Crimes against Humanity and War crimes is the implication that the aim of genocide is the obliteration of an ethnic, racial, national or religious identity in all its forms. It is both the physical destruction of people as the destruction of an identity in the mental, historical, social and cultural landscape. Think for example of the destruction of language, customs, shrines, temples, churches, identity indicators and cultural heritage. Othering or the process of Othering take center stage in the genocidal process.
But that alone does not constitute genocide.
As a matter of fact genocide scholars, human rights advocates and international prosecutors are careful of using this terminology. The reason for this is the broad misuse of the word “genocide” and its political sensitivity.
Genocide happens in a machinery of violence. It is often well organized and the duration of the violence itself, abide extreme, is relatively fierce and short lived. The aim of this violence is a specific identifiable group and its institutions.
Where genocide is well organized, happens during a frenzy of violence and in a machinery, communal violence is often spontaneous, short lived and happens within isolated moments. It
misses the machinery behind it. Yet, especially in the Chittagong Hill Tracs, we see forms of violence that could be interpreted and contributed to genocide or in a lesser extent to ethnic
cleansing. Some of the modes of violence includes for example: the destruction of property, the desecration of shrines and temples, landgrab, torture, sexual violence, lynching and forced
conversions. Yet if misses the machinery, the infrastructure and sometimes the fierce extremity and momentum of violence that are so characteristic for genocide. So how could we define this? And what role does blasphemy laws play?
This question can be answered by the analysis by political scholar Levene (1999)ii. He studied the persecution of minorities in the Chittagong Hill Tracs and came to the conclusion that there was an unique element playing in Bangladesh. This had to do with the fact that especially in the provinces the central government of Bangladesh could be described as a weak state (Migdal 1988) iii. The influence of the State is here limited. Political influence is localized. This leads to a phenomenon of “creeping genocide” where local authorities can use violence with impunity often in the cloak of mob violence.
This is called “creeping genocide” for the persecution of an identity doesn’t occur in one violent moment but through different episodes and moments over time. The persecution is slow, but its aim is the same.
Blasphemy laws can play an catalytic role in this. It gives a legal authority to mob violence and persecution and hides even further the ethnic and religious dimensions in which the violence occurs. It creates a volatile mix between identity politics and local authorities and cloaks the intent and heightens the impunity. It makes the process of “creeping genocide” more invisible.
We should be aware of this. We should be aware of the complexity that is entangled with mob violence and weight that the legality of the blasphemy laws bring. Especially when we take the upcoming elections on the 12th of February into account. For in this volatile moment of time there is a call within the more extreme elements of political Islam and the Islamic party Jamaate-Islam to model the present day blasphemy laws with the more extreme laws like 295-C in Pakistan. To follow this example, taking the phenomenon of “creeping genocide” into account, will open the door to more atrocities.
We should be aware of this. And we should shadow the remarks of Chief Advisor Muhammed Yunus in this light.
