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Bangladesh jail authorities ask family members to meet death row war criminal Kamaruzzaman

Xinhua, April 11, 2015 Adjust font size:

Bangladesh jail authorities have asked family members to meet death row war criminal Muhammad Kamaruzzaman, raising speculation that the Islamist party leader might be executed Saturday.

The jail authorities Saturday afternoon asked the family members to meet Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami party's Assistant Secretary General at the Dhaka Central Jail between 4:00 p.m. ( local time) and 5:00 p.m. Saturday evening, Shishir Manir, one of the his counsels, told journalists.

The authorities called his family shortly after Bangladeshi State Minister for Home Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal told journalists that the Jamaat leader may be executed later on Saturday.

The death sentence of the war crimes handed down on Kamaruzzaman is being executed after the Appellate Division Monday dismissed his plea for final review to the Supreme Court verdict that confirmed the capital punishment awarded by International War Crimes Tribunal on May 9, 2013.

Bangladesh Supreme Court judges on Wednesday signed the death verdict for convicted war criminal Mohammad Kamaruzzaman.

The four-member Appellate Division bench of Bangladesh Supreme Court led by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha upheld its verdict Monday on Kamaruzzaman for crimes against humanity during the country' s war of independence in 1971.

Sources said the jail authorities are preparing to execute his sentence as he is reluctant to seek presidential mercy.

Kamaruzzaman's lawyer Shishir Munir had earlier told journalists that his client will not seek mercy from the president.

Jamaat Monday again pleaded Kamaruzzaman's innocence and claimed that he had no links with war crimes in 1971 when he was a high school student.

Another Jamaat leader Abdul Quader Molla, convicted of war crimes in 1971, was executed on Dec. 12, 2013.

Muslim-majority Bangladesh was called East Pakistan until 1971. The government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said about 3 million people were killed in the 7-month war although independent researchers believe between 300,000 and 500,000 died.

After returning to power in January 2009, Hasina, the daughter of Bangladesh's independence hero Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, established the first tribunal in March 2010, almost 40 years after the 1971 war. Endi