Bangladesh: Islamist party leader gets death sentence for war crimes

The leader of Bangladesh’s largest Islamist party has been sentenced to death for war crimes, in a long-awaited verdict that has triggered fears of fresh violence, the Guardian reported.

Bangladesh’s war crimes court found Motiur Rahman Nizami, 71, guilty of murder, rape and looting during the country’s war of independence against Pakistan in 1971 when he was head of a ruthless militia.

The court sentenced Nizami, head of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, to hang by the neck until his death for orchestrating the killing of top professors, writers and doctors during the conflict.

“It’s a historic verdict,” the prosecutor Haider Ali said outside the packed court in Dhaka.

The court ruled that Nizami was head of the al-Badr militia, “which took part in many heinous crimes,” Ali said.

“The court observed that he is an Islamic scholar but he misinterpreted the Qur’an.”

Security was tightened across Bangladesh before the verdict after similar judgments against several of Nizami’s senior lieutenants plunged the country into one of its worst crises last year.