8 charges pressed against 3 accused

The prosecution yesterday pressed eight charges against three war crimes accused for their alleged crimes against humanity and genocide in Bagerhat during the Liberation War in 1971.

The accused are Sheikh Sirajul Haque alias Siraj Master, 72, Khan Akram Hossain, 61, and Abdul Latif Talukdar, 68.

The trio joined the Razakar Bahini, an auxiliary force of the Pakistani occupation army, in 1971 and committed killing, mass killing, rape, loot, arson and forced conversion, according to the prosecution.

Prosecutor Syed Sayedul Haque Suman submitted the formal charges, investigation report and other relevant documents to the International Crimes Tribunal-1 through its registrar's office around 2:30pm.

Of the accused, Latif and Akram were arrested on June 10 and June 20 respectively, while Sirajul, who went into hiding after issuance of a warrant of arrest by the tribunal, was arrested on July 21.

On August 25, the investigation agency of the international crimes tribunals submitted the final probe report to the Chief Prosecutor's Office of the international crimes tribunals.

ASP Helal Uddin, the investigation officer, began the probe on May 21, 2013.

PROBE FINDINGS

Of the eight charges, four have been brought against Sirajul alone for killing around 666 people, two against all of them for killing 47 people and two against Khan Akram and Abdul Latif for converting 200 Hindus and killing a person.

According to the probe report, Sirajul on May 13, 1971 was involved in the killing of 40-50 Hindus at Ranjitpur in the district. Their houses were also plundered.

On May 21, 1971, an armed group killed around 600 to 700 Hindus when several thousand Hindus gathered at Kalimandir in Dakra of Rampal of the district in order to go to refugee camps in India.

Nineteen civilians of Besorgati and Kandapara under Bagerhat Sadar were detained, tortured and killed on June 18, 1971. Sirajul is found to have been involved in the killings, the probe report reads.

AZHAR's CASE

The defence of Jamaat leader ATM Azharul Islam have meanwhile completed placing closing arguments before the three-member tribunal-1.

The defence yesterday told the tribunal that the prosecution had failed to prove the charges brought against Azharul on his alleged involvement in crimes against humanity.

Pointing out the prosecution's arguments where they claimed that minor inconsistencies could have occurred as the incident was taken place more than four decades ago, defence counsel Shishir Manir argued that major discrepancies were found in the testimony of witnesses.

He quoted testimony of a rape victim, who gave different versions regarding the duration of her pregnancy while being tortured at Rangpur Town Hall Torture Camp.

Earlier, the prosecution claimed that Rangpur Town Hall was used as a torture camp and prayed to the tribunal to take the matter into their judicial notice when the tribunal found the evidence produced by prosecution insufficient.

Shishir argued that among the three judges, only the chairman of the tribunal had knowledge of Rangpur Town Hall Torture Camp, which means the use of Rangpur Town Hall as a torture camp is not a matter of common knowledge and could not be taken into judicial notice. 

Azharul faces six charges for his alleged involvement in crimes against humanity and genocide. He was produced before the tribunal yesterday.