Top Jamaat leader hanged in Bangladesh for war crimes

Abdul Quader Molla was convicted of rape, murder and mass murder.


Afp December 12, 2013
Jamaat-e-Islami leader Abdul Quader Molla. PHOTO: REUTERS/FILE

DHAKA: After Bangladesh's highest court upheld the death penalty for a top Jamaat-e-Islami leader convicted of war crimes, he was hanged on Thursday evening, according to reports on Bangladeshi television.

His execution comes just two days after he was given a dramatic last-minute reprieve from execution.

Earlier on Thursday, the Bangladesh Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice Muzammel Hossain "dismissed" Abdul Quader Molla's appeal for a final review of his death sentence, meaning he could be hanged.

"There is now no legal bar to execute him," Attorney General Mahbubey Alam told AFP in the court, amid applause by pro-government lawyers.

On Tuesday night a judge had stayed the hanging of Molla, just 90 minutes before his scheduled execution at a jail in Dhaka, amid a global outcry over the fairness of his and other trials held for alleged war crimes.

Molla is the first person put to death for massacres committed during the 1971 war following a series of verdicts by a special war crimes court that have sparked deadly protests.

A key opposition leader, the 65-year-old was found to have killed some of Bangladesh's top professors, doctors, writers and journalists.

Molla was convicted of rape, murder and mass murder, including the killing of more than 350 unarmed Bengali civilians.

Since Wednesday, the Supreme Court has heard an appeal on whether Molla could seek a review of the death sentence, with his lawyers arguing that he had "a constitutional right" to do so.

However Attorney General Alam told the court that there was "no scope for a review in war crimes cases".

COMMENTS (62)

Fatimah Bint-e-Islam | 10 years ago | Reply

and what about the killers of about 4 Lac Biharis? Who will bring them to courts?

Kk | 10 years ago | Reply

ET is biased.it doesn't publish any comment that is against india

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