Charges against 3 Bagerhat ‘Razakars’ taken into cognisance

A tribunal in Dhaka today took cognisance of eight charges against three war crimes accused for their alleged crimes against humanity and genocide in Bagerhat during the country’s 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.
After taking the charges into cognisance, the International Crimes Tribunal-1 rejected a petition filed by Talukdar seeking bail. However, the other two accused did not seek bail.
The tribunal today also appointed a defence lawyer, Md Abul Hasan, for Siraj as he did not appoint any counsel for him.
The court fixed September 30 for starting hearing on the charge framing of the case in presence of the three accused.
Yesterday, Prosecutor Syed Sayedul Haque Suman submitted the formal charges to the tribunal.
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.