Rape at Saudi safe house: Deputy secretary sacked

The authority has fired Deputy Secretary Mehedi Hasan, who was suspended for sexual assault and rape of housekeepers sheltered at a safe house of the Bangladesh Embassy in Saudi Arabia.

After completing all necessary steps including the investigation, public administration ministry announced the decision on Thursday (July 6).

The 21st BCS administration cadre officer was relieved of his duties as counsellor at the embassy in January 2021 after the allegations of sexual assault surfaced. He was suspended the following month, said the notification.

Later, a show cause notice was served against him on March 10, in that year. On April 8, 2021, Mehdi Hasan filed a written response to the show cause notice and applied for a personal hearing. The government opened an investigation and appointed probe officials as his explanation at the hearing was not satisfactory.

The detectives submitted the probe report on December 20, 2022. The investigators found that Mehedi had called the housekeepers for nonessential interviews and sexually harassed them with obscene questions. Allegations of rape were also found to be true.