Staff Reporter
Rtnn: Sanctions are intended to change behaviour and promote accountability, said Vedant Patel, deputy spokesperson of the US State Department
   
Claims that the US sanctions on RAB are being lifted are not true, said Vedant Patel, the deputy spokesperson of the US Department of State. 

He made the remark during yesterday's (16 May) regular briefing at the US State Department in response to a question about Bangladesh.

During the briefing, a journalist asked Patel whether the sanctions on RAB were being lifted following a meeting with Donald Lu, the US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, who is visiting Bangladesh. 

The journalist relayed that the Bangladeshi prime minister's investment advisor told reporters after the meeting that the White House and the State Department are working to remove the sanctions on RAB. 

In response, Vedant Patel said the claims are false. "The United States is not withdrawing the sanctions against RAB," he said. 

"Sanctions are intended to change behaviour and promote accountability," Patel added.

Earlier on 10 December 2021, the US Treasury Department imposed human rights-related sanctions on Bangladesh's elite paramilitary force RAB and seven of its current and former officers, accusing them of being involved in hundreds of enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings since 2009.

The sanctions bar RAB from owning properties in the US as well as engaging in any financial transaction with a US body or personnel.