Staff Correspondent:

Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus on Wednesday visited three spots in Dhaka that were previously used as “torture cells and secret prisons”.

Chief Adviser’s Press Secretary Shafiqul Alam said thousands of victims of enforced disappearances were kept — some for eight-nine years — by security forces of the Sheikh Hasina regime in the Aynaghars, the secret prisons.

The Human Rights Watch has said Hasina herself ordered enforced disappearances and extrajudicial murders, Alam said.

Advisers Dr Asif Nazrul, Syeda Rizwana Hasan, Adilur Rahman Khan, Asif Mahmud, Mahfuj Alam and Nahid Islam, among others, were present.

Members of the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances, victims, local and international media accompanied the Chief Adviser during the visit in the spots located in Dhaka’s Agargaon, Kachukhet and Uttara areas.

The Chief Adviser was shown an “electric chair” used in a torture cell in Agargaon.

Enforced disappearance victims also talked to the Chief Adviser during his visit to torture cells and secret prisons.

Barrister Mir Ahmad bin Quasem Arman stood in front of the small Aynaghar, a secret prison inside the Rapid Action Battalion-1 compound in Uttara, where he was allegedly detained for eight years.

He narrated his sufferings to Chief Adviser Dr Yunus during the visit.