the Bihari Community in Bangladesh 671 punish 195 Pakistani PoWs who were detained in India, and had been accused of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and other crimes committed in 1971.46 Furthermore, Bangladesh agreed that the no trials of the 195 PoWs shall take place during the entire period of repatriation of non-Bengalis in Bangladesh.47 Concerning non-Bengalis in Bangladesh, Pakistan stated that its Government had already issued clearance for the movement to Pakistan for those non-Bengalis who were either domiciled in former East Pakistan, were employees of the Central Government and their family members, or were members of divided families, irrespective of their original domicile.48 After the Tripartite Agreement, a large number of the Bihari community were repatriated to Pakistan under the supervision of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (unhcr) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (icrc).49 The repatriation process (that included numerous obstacles) began in 1974 and the last batch of repatriations took place in 1993.50 After several repatriation programs during that period, the Urdu-speaking community’s numbers had swelled in Bangladesh,, but they continued to face human rights violations with regard to their nationality and citizenship.51 Later, Pakistan felt no legal obligation to grant citizenship to those in the Bihari community who did not fall into the categories enumerated in the Tripartite Agreement.52 The repatriation programme has stopped for more than two decades. 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 K. Sellars, ‘International Crimes Tribunals, Bangladesh’, Dictionnaire Encyclopedique de la Justice Penale international (2017) p. 1, forthcoming, <www.law.cuhk.edu.hk/userfiles/ people/kirstensellars/K_Sellars_Bangladesh_tribunals_201016.pdf>, visited on 12 June 2017. Agreement on Repatriation of Persons, <www.mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/ 5868/Agreement+on+Repatriation+of+Persons>, visited on 8 June 2017. Delhi Agreement, supra note 40. Naimul Muquim, ‘Strangers to Citizenship: An Analysis of the Deplorable Conditions of the Urdu-Speaking Community in Bangladesh’, Master of Laws Thesis, Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies of Law, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, 2017, <open.library.ubc.ca/cIRcle/collections/ubctheses/24/items/1.0343565>, visited on 14 June 2017. Tasmia Persoob, ‘Social Identity and Its Impact on the Camp Based Urdu Speaking Community in Bangladesh’, 19 Osaka University Knowledge Archive (2014) p. 23, online at <ir.library.osaka-u.ac.jp/dspace/handle/11094/53813>, visited on 11 June 2017. Muquim, supra note 49, p. 16. Gerrard Khan, ‘Citizenship and statelessness in South Asia’, (2001), working Paper No. 47, <www.ecoi.net/file_upload/1226_1272465707_3bf0ff124.pdf>, visited on 7 April 2015. international journal on minority and group rights 25 (2018) 664-678 This content downloaded from 147.188.245.205 on Wed, 25 Oct 2023 15:43:57 +00:00 All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms <UN>