NFLgeopolitical landscape, it also bears a more complex and lesser-known
December 16, 1971 marked the end of the Bangladesh Liberation War, a short-lived conflict between India and Pakistan that established the People’s Republic of Bangladesh from the territory of the former province of East Pakistan. Although the war is best remembered for its dramatic alteration of South Asia’s geopolitical landscape, it also bears a more complex and lesser-known set of legacies for how we think about Cold War international relations, twentieth-century genocidal and sexual violence, and the limits of international law in post-conflict societies. The province East Pakistan was created during independence from the British empire in 1947. At that time, the South Asian subcontinent was partitioned into two countries: India (including lands with a Hindu majority) and Pakistan (lands with a Muslim majority). The people and territory of East Bengal became East Pakistan. East and West Pakistan were geographically, culturally, and ideologically distant and distinct. An independ...