UN to honour Six Bangladeshi peacekeepers posthumously

The United Nations is going to posthumously honour six Bangladeshi peacekeepers who lost their lives while serving under the UN flag in Abyei.
They will be posthumously honoured with ‘Dag Hammarskjöld Medal’ at the UN Headquarters on June 5,2026.

The medals will be awarded by UN Secretary-General António Guterres during a ceremony marking the International Day of United Nations Peacekeepers, which will be observed at the UN Headquarters in New York on June 5, said a UN press release. 

The six Bangladeshi peacekeepers are Md Jahangir Alam, Md Sobuj Mia, Md Masud Rana, Md Mominul Islam, Shamim Reza and Santo Mondol. 
They were killed in a drone strike on December 13, 2025 while serving with the United Nations Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA).

The Secretary-General will lay a wreath in honour of nearly 4,500 peacekeepers who have lost their lives since 1948 and will present the ‘Dag Hammarskjöld Medal’ posthumously to 68 military, police and civilian peacekeepers from different countries who made the ultimate sacrifice in the line of duty, including 59 who died last year.
Bangladesh is currently is the fourth-largest contributor of uniformed personnel to UN peacekeeping operations, with more than 4,000 military and police personnel, including 277 women, deployed in missions in Abyei, the Central African Republic, Cyprus, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lebanon, Libya, South Sudan and Western Sahara.