India lobbied US to go easy on Sheikh Hasina before her ouster as Bangladesh Prime Minister: Report

According to The Washington Post report, US diplomats had publicly harangued Sheikh Hasina for jailing thousands of her rivals and critics ahead of an election scheduled for last January, while the Joe Biden administration had sanctioned Rapid Action Battalion or RAB — a Bangladeshi police unit under Hasina’s command accused of carrying out extrajudicial abductions and killings — and had threatened imposing visa restrictions on Bangladeshis who undermined democracy or committed human rights abuses.

But Indian officials, in a series of meetings, had demanded that the US tone down its pro-democracy rhetoric.

Indian officials argued if the opposition were allowed to gain power in an open election, Bangladesh would become a breeding ground for Islamist groups posing a threat to India’s national security.

“You approach it at the level of democracy, but for us, the issues are much, much more serious and existential,” an Indian government adviser was quoted as saying by The Washington Post.

“There were a lot of conversations with the Americans where we said, ‘This is a core concern for us, and you can’t take us as a strategic partner unless we have some kind of strategic consensus,’” the official told the American daily on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private talks.

Ultimately, the Joe Biden administration substantially softened its criticism and shelved threats of further sanctions against Hasina’s government, which disappointed many in Bangladesh, as per the report.

US officials say it was a calculated decision that had little to do with Indian pressure, said the report, adding that many details of the bilateral discussions and US deliberations have not been reported previously.

Now, after protesters defied the Bangladeshi army’s curfew orders and marched on 76-year-old Hasina’s official residence, Ganabhaban, compelling her to flee to India, policymakers in both New Delhi and Washington are forced to confront whether they mishandled Bangladesh, according to the report.

Photo Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons/Nahidhasan027

“There is always a balancing act in Bangladesh, as there is in many places where the situation on the ground is complicated and you want to work with the partners you have in a way that is not inconsistent with what the American people expect,” a US official, who like several others interviewed spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s diplomatic sensitivity, told The Washington Post.

Divisions emerged within the US government over how to handle Bangladesh in the months leading up to the January election in the South Asian nation, the report said.

Some in the US Department of State, including then-Ambassador Peter Haas and other embassy officials, argued for a tougher stance against Sheikh Hasina, particularly since President Joe Biden had campaigned on a foreign policy plank of restoring democracy, The Washington Post reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

However, Peter Haas, who has since retired, declined to comment on the matter.

Other US officials felt there was little to be gained from further alienating the then Bangladeshi PM and risking the safety of US diplomats, including Haas, who had received threats from Hasina’s followers.

Some officials in the White House also considered the downside of antagonizing India, which made a series of appeals to the US that it moderate its pressure on Hasina, including when Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh met with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin in November last year in New Delhi, reports The Washington Post, citing people familiar with the matter.

Indian national security adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval also played a key role in presenting the Indian case during a visit to Washington that autumn, the report added.

“The US approach to Bangladesh was always one that tried to both be consistent with our values — and we spoke about those publicly on many occasions — but also pragmatic about the reality that the situation in Bangladesh was very complicated and that there were a number of interests that we had there and that other countries had there,” a US official was quoted as saying by The Washington Post.

“We needed to try to find a constructive way to engage with that administration, as we do in all places. So our policy was much more about trying to strike a balance between both of those things,” the official told the American media outlet.

Photo Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons/Rayhan9d

Earlier in January, after Hasina claimed victory in a "one-sided" election with many of her opponents in jail or in hiding, Indian officials endorsed the election results, fueling calls from the Bangladeshi opposition for a boycott of Indian imports.

Last year, in the tiny Indian Ocean country of the Maldives, Mohamed Muizzu rose to power as president by campaigning on an “India Out” platform, and in Sri Lanka, anti-Indian sentiment flared this year after Narednra Modi claimed on the campaign trail that his opponents gave India’s rightful territory cheaply away to Sri Lanka, according to The Washington Post.

“The US has built its relationship with India and has this tendency to defer to its wishes in the region, and probably nowhere was that more evident than Bangladesh,” Jon Danilowicz, a retired US diplomat who served as deputy chief of mission in Dhaka, told The Washington Post.

“New Delhi and Washington have to show some humility and acknowledge they got Bangladesh wrong by not siding with the Bangladeshi people and their democratic aspirations,” Danilowicz now added.

US officials have strongly disputed the characterization that they were swayed by Indian lobbying.

Blinken had led efforts to reduce violence and encourage a fair and free election in its run-up, a US State Department official told The Washington Post.

“Both Sheikh Hasina herself and opposition leaders said the Secretary’s steps reduced violence,” the official added. “After the elections, which were neither free nor fair, some criticized the US for not imposing more restrictions on Bangladeshis, falsely attributing this to Indian influence.”

After Hasina’s ouster, which followed weeks of unrest in which hundreds of protesters were killed, Indian officials have publicly changed tack and expressed willingness to work with whoever comes to power.

Narendra Modi, last week, sent his “best wishes” to Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel Prize-winning banker who took charge of Bangladesh’s interim government, even though he criticized India for backing Sheikh Hasina.

Muhammad Yunus has called for new, free and fair elections once stability is restored in the country, the report said.

Photo Courtesy: PID Bangladesh

The United States Department of State endorsed Yunus, with spokesman Matthew Miller saying the US hoped to see “the Bangladeshi people decide the future of the Bangladeshi government,” according to the report.

Aside from the US, India had simultaneously warned other Western governments about the dangers of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) returning to power.

“It was intense,” recalled an official from a Western country allied with the United States. “They started briefing Western governments that Bangladesh could become the next Afghanistan, that the BNP could lead to instability, violence and terror,” according to The Washington Post.

Indian officials say they have reason to feel burned by the Bangladeshi opposition, the report added.

During the rule of Hasina’s rivals, the BNP, in the mid-2000s, militants smuggled weapons to attack northeast India and trained in camps inside Bangladesh with the help of Pakistani intelligence, Indian officials were quoted as saying by The Washington Post.

Indian and US officials say this experience with BNP rule explained why India had been so adamant on keeping Hasina in power for 15 years, as per the report.

In recent days, Indian officials have warned that Bangladeshi Islamist political party, the Jamaat-e-Islami, could gain power, and Indian media have reported on a spike in attacks on Bangladesh’s Hindu minority population in the days since Hasina was deposed, reports The Washington Post.

BNP leaders, who could win if elections are soon held, say they have met Indian officials in recent years to mend ties and assure them that India — and Hindus in Bangladesh — would be safe if India stopped propping up Hasina and the BNP returned, the outlet reported.

“We’ve been in touch with India, trying to tell them, ‘Don’t put all your eggs in one basket,’” Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury, a senior BNP leader, told The Washington Post.

“We have tried to assuage whatever concerns India has. It would be stupid for both sides to carry the baggage of the past,” he added.

Photo Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons/Indian Prime Minister's Office

As India grapples with the shock of suddenly losing one of its closest allies, Indian foreign policy circles and media have been awash with speculation that Washington orchestrated the removal of Sheikh Hasina, who has long had a chilly relationship with the US, the report said.

However, top US officials have staunchly denied the claim.

Others in the Indian government say India was to blame for propping up an autocrat for so long, the report said, adding that a former senior Indian national security official said it made sense, in theory, to support Hasina, but New Delhi did not grasp the situation on the ground.

“Everybody who came from Dhaka was giving the same feedback that anti-India feelings are at an unprecedented level, yet we calculated that she has full control over the administrative and coercive arms of the state,” the former Indian official told The Washington Post.

“We thought repeated attempts to destabilize the government have failed, so she will manage again. The truth is, the whole thing just needed a spark to set the whole house on fire,” the official added.