Bangladesh’s highest court yesterday upheld a death sentence against a leader of the country’s largest Islamic party after he was convicted of committing war crimes, including mass murder, during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War.
The Bangladeshi Supreme Court’s rejection of Mohammad Kamaruzzaman’s appeal means that he is to now be hanged within months, unless the case is reviewed again or he is granted clemency by the nation’s president.
The 62-year-old assistant secretary-general of the Jamaat-e-Islami Party is expected to be the second senior Muslim militant to hang for crimes committed during the war in which East Pakistan seceded from Pakistan to become Bangladesh.
Another senior Jamaat official, Abdul Quader Molla, was executed in December last year after being convicted on similar charges
Jamaat called a nationwide 48-hour strike beginning tomorrow morning to protest the ruling.
In the past week, Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal — a domestic court — has sentenced Jamaat Supreme Leader Motiur Rahman Nizami and key financier Mir Quasem Ali to death.
The convictions of some of Nizami’s top lieutenants last year triggered the country’s deadliest political violence since independence. Tens of thousands of Jaamat activists clashed with police in protests that left about 500 people dead. There were no immediate reports of violence after yesterday’s announcement.
A three-day strike called by Jamaat to protest Nizami’s sentencing was set to conclude yesterday after forcing schools, businesses and bus services to shut down and triggering sporadic violence.
Five small bombs exploded in the capital late on Sunday, but no one was injured, Dhaka police Assistant Commissioner Saifur Rahman said.
Critics say the latest flurry of judgements are designed to intimidate the opposition, which has been stepping up protests against Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government.
In recent weeks, Jamaat and the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party have held a series of giant rallies to demand fresh polls after Hasina was controversially re-elected in January in a contest boycotted by the opposition.
Rights groups have said the trials have fallen short of international standards and lack any foreign oversight.
Hasina’s government maintains the trials are needed to heal the wounds of the conflict, which it says left 3 million people dead. Independent researchers estimate that between 300,000 and 500,000 people died in the 1971 war.
Kamaruzzaman was found guilty in May last year of mass murder, torture and abductions. The prosecution centered on a mass killing at the border town of Sohagpur, which has become known as the “Village of Widows,” after at least 120 unarmed farmers were lined up and slaughtered in paddy fields.
Three of the widows testified against him during his trial.
“My mother did not live to see this day. I am sure this verdict would have lessened her pain,” said Jalal Uddin, whose father, a brother and five other relatives were shot dead in the carnage. “Thirty-one widows are still alive. They are happy.”
Prosecutors said Kamaruzzaman was also an organizer of notorious al-Badr militia accused of killing top academics, writers and doctors.
Defense lawyers rejected the charges as “baseless.”
“We are extremely disappointed,” defense lawyer Tajul Islam said after yesterday’s judgement, adding that they would seek a review, as the death sentence was upheld by a majority decision.
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