A court in Bangladesh has ordered officials to request an Interpol red notice for British Labour MP Tulip Siddiq over a corruption case related to the allocation of government land in Dhaka. The anti-corruption commission alleges Siddiq used her relationship with her aunt, former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, to influence the allocation of state-owned land to a private company. Siddiq has rejected the claim as baseless and politically motivated.
Siddiq, the MP for Hampstead and Highgate, was convicted in absentia last year and sentenced to two years' imprisonment in Bangladesh. She faces a combined six-year sentence across multiple cases involving her aunt and other family members. She has denied the charges, claiming much of the evidence was forged.
Red notices are requests to police forces worldwide, not international arrest warrants, and individual countries decide whether to enforce them. The UK does not have an extradition treaty with Bangladesh, complicating any attempt to return Siddiq. She resigned as a Treasury minister last year, saying the controversy risked distracting from the government's work, though she denied wrongdoing.
Leading British lawyers, including former justice secretary Robert Buckland KC and former attorney general Dominic Grieve, criticised the trial for due-process concerns. They said Siddiq was denied basic rights, and a lawyer she instructed was put under house arrest and faced threats to his daughter. They described the process as 'artificial and contrived'.
The interim government in Bangladesh has prioritised legal action against Hasina and senior figures from her former government over alleged corruption and human rights abuses. Hasina has remained in exile in India since her fall from power in August, and India has not responded to extradition requests.
