Persecution of Bangladeshi Nobel laureate is political ‘vendetta’ by Hasina government: analysts

Renowned Bangladeshi economist and Nobel Prize laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus is at the centre of a new embezzlement trial because of a political “vendetta” against him by the government, observers say, echoing an open letter by world leaders last year condemning the alleged persecution.

Yunus is facing a new trial next month following a criminal case in which he is accused of embezzling more than US$2 million from a workers’ welfare fund of Grameen Telecom, one of the non-profit companies he founded.

The economist is credited with lifting millions of people out of poverty through his pioneering use of microloans through Grameen Bank, which he founded in 1983 for those unable to procure loans from conventional banks. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his grass-roots development work in Bangladesh, then one of the world’s poorest countries in the world.

Around 200 cases have been filed against Yunus since Sheikh Hasina first became Bangladesh’s prime minister in 2009, mostly for allegedly violating labour laws and embezzling funds from some of the more than 50 social business firms that he had set up in the country.

Supporters of Yunus allege that the cases mark a campaign by Bangladeshi authorities to harass and vilify the economist, one of the country’s most high-profile figures and a bitter and long-time rival of Hasina.

In January, Yunus was sentenced to six months in prison for violating labour laws at Grameen Telecom, which together with Norway’s state-owned Telenor is a shareholder in Bangladesh’s largest mobile operator Grameenphone. But he remains out on bail pending further proceedings.