Chowdhury Fazlul Bari


Chowdhury Fazlul Bari is a Bangladesh Army officer and former Director General of Directorate General of Forces Intelligence.

Career

Bari joined the elite Rapid Action Battalion in 2004 when it was founded. The last post he held in RAB was additional director general. In 2005 he defended Rapid Action Battalions practice of extrajudicial killing of suspects to the US embassy. He was transferred by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party of Director General of Directorate General of Forces Intelligence as its Director General. He was responsible for the arrest of numerous politicians and businessmen during the Military backed caretaker government headed by Fakhruddin Ahmed. At the end of the caretaker government he was posted to Bangladesh's diplomatic mission in Washington, D.C.. He was recalled from his post after the elected Awami League government took power. He refused and Bangladesh Army declared him absent without leave. In 2009 he declared a deserter. During the caretaker administration he tried to aid Bangladesh Freedom Party and National Democratic Alliance. The freedom party was formed by the military officers who killed Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the first president of Bangladesh in a coup. He married Mehnaz Rashid, the eldest daughter of Lieutenant Colonel Khandaker Abdur Rashid, one the killers of Sheikh Mujib and a leader of the Freedom Party. He divorced her in December 2008. He denied marrying her. In 2009 he applied for political asylum in the United States.