Bangladesh will not issue a new passport or national identity card (NID) to ousted prime minister Sheikh Hasina as the Foreign Affairs State Minister Humaiun Kobir said on Monday. He said the government will instead ask India to hand her over under the existing extradition treaty.
He was responding to reporters at the Foreign Ministry about a letter from Hasina's lawyers. The London-based law firm Matrix Chambers wrote to Preeti Rahman the acting high commissioner at Bangladesh's embassy in Delhi. The letter asked for a new passport and NID for Hasina also citing the reported cancellation of her existing documents by the interim government and other authorities. It asked that the applications be processed "expeditiously" under her Bangladeshi nationality and international human rights obligations.
Reuters saw the letter and said it was Hasina's first such request since she fled in 2024. It is seen as her clearest step towards returning to Bangladesh in December. Hasina who is staying in New Delhi told Reuters she plans to return and surrender before a court. Her aides said the date will be announced once formalities are completed.
The minister called the request ridiculous. "Bangladesh does not give passports to terrorists. It asks for them to be handed over" he said. There was no question, he added of issuing travel documents to a fugitive convict. He said legal notices from foreign law firms would not change her legal status.
Hasina's return could not be treated as an ordinary journey, he said. The International Crimes Tribunal sentenced her to death in absentia in November last year for ordering a deadly crackdown on the 2024 student-led uprising. She denies the charges. The minister said she also faces other cases that could carry the maximum penalty. If returned, she would be taken to prison under proper security arrangements.
Kobir urged the British law firm to learn about its client before taking the case. He accused Hasina of killing thousands of people, abducting people and carrying out extrajudicial killings. He also alleged that money looted from state resources was being used to pay foreign lawyers and lobbying firms. "Exercise some moral judgment" he said.
He claimed that only a few of the 650 UK Members of Parliament had sided with Hasina. He said her only route home is formal extradition from India.
