Al Jazeera has obtained video footage suggesting that the Bangladesh government has been providing inaccurate death tolls from recent violence.
According to official figures, 11 people had died during fighting between police and protesters from Hifazat-e-Islam, an Islamic group, on May 6, a day protesters refer to as the “Siege of Dhaka”.
Human Rights Watch, a US-based rights group, said that the exact number of deaths resulting from the protests are “unclear”.
“Independent news sources put the figure at approximately 50 dead, with others succumbing to injuries later,” HRW said in a statement on Saturday.
In an interview with Al Jazeera, Bangladesh’s Foreign Minister Dipu Moni downplayed reports of inaccuracy in government figures.
“There can always be an inquiry, there can always be an investigation,” said Moni.
“The government or most of the people in the country doesn’t even think that there was any controversy with the matter,” she added.
Abdul Jalil, a deaf and mute grave digger at Dhaka’s state-run cemetery, communicated that he buried 14 bodies of bearded men with gunshot wounds after the protest, all at night.
The rights group wants an independent inquiry to find out what happened once and for all.
Genocide in Bangladesh 