Bangladesh court commutes Islamist leader's death sentence

Delwar Hossain Sayedeen gets life imprisonment following appeal.

Jamaat-e-Islami leader Delwar Hossain Sayedee is escorted by police during his war crimes trial

Dhaka:  Bangladesh’s Supreme Court on Wednesday commuted a death sentence handed down to an Islamist leader for crimes against humanity to life imprisonment, triggering angry protests by both his Islamist supporters and secular opponents and clashes with police.

Delwar Hossain Sayedee, 74, a former parliamentarian and vice-president of the hardline Islamic Jamaat-e-Islami Party, was sentenced to death on February 28 last year by a Bangladesh war crimes tribunal.

Sayedee was found guilty of mass killings, rape, arson and the forced conversion of Hindus during the country’s 1971 war of independence from Pakistan.

His death sentence sparked violent protests from supporters and led to weeks of violence during which more than 100 people were killed.

Both state and defense lawyers later appealed against the verdict in the Supreme Court.

Wednesday’s judgment was delivered amid tight security. Despite the sentence reduction, defense lawyers said Sayedee maintains his innocence and has called for nothing less than a full acquittal.

“Like other cases against Jamaat leaders, the case against Mr Sayedee is politically motivated. We are dismayed he has been given a life sentence,” said attorney SM Shahjahan. “We will appeal to the court for a review of the verdict.”

Bangladesh’s 1972 War Crimes Act currently has no provision for a petition review after an appeal verdict is announced.

The Supreme Court's decision came as a blow to hundreds of young secularists and bloggers who began gathering on Monday in Dhaka's Shahbag Square to call on the court to uphold the death sentence for Sayedee as well as for other war criminals. As news of the verdict came down, violence erupted between police and the demonstrators.

Armed with batons, police fired tear gas and a water cannon to try to disperse the demonstrators who shouted slogans and threw stones at officers.

“This is a biased and disappointing verdict. It is really saddening to see a man who committed all possible war crimes has been granted mercy by the top court,” said Dr Imran H Sarker, coordinator of the Blogger and Online Activist Network, a forum of secularists.

Activists would continue mobilizing public opinion and press the government for the death sentence for war criminals and a ban on Jamaat, Sarker added.

In 1971, the eastern portion of Pakistan broke away to become an independent Bangladesh after a nine-month war.

Jamaat opposed Bangladesh independence and its leadership stands accused of aiding the Pakistan army in committing war crimes through Islamic militia groups.

Established in 2010, Bangladesh's war crimes tribunal has sentenced nine politicians, mostly from Jamaat, to death or to life imprisonment. Top leader Abdul Kader Mollah was hanged in December after the Supreme Court upheld his death sentence. Several other leaders are also being prosecuted.

The ruling Awami League Party says the war crimes trials are necessary for national healing. But Jamaat and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, a longtime ally and the country’s second-largest political party, say the trials are a “tool for political vendetta.”

International rights groups including the New York-based Human Rights Watch have criticized the tribunal for being “procedurally flawed” and “falling short of international standards”.

Source: AFP/UCAN