Bangladesh war crimes trial standard worth following

Criticising the detractors of the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT), a law professor yesterday said Bangladesh had set a new standard in conducting the trial of international crimes, so the process should be followed by other courts dealing with such crimes.

Prof Muhammad Rafiqul Islam, who teaches law at Macquarie University, Australia, said, “None of the courts that conducted trial of international crimes were purely national. Bangladesh is the first one. There should not be any logic to follow standard of international or mix tribunals' standards.”

“Its [ICT] achievement has to be looked at in ending impunity and delivering justice to victims that international community has failed for decades,” he said in a lecture on "Importance of the National Trials of International Crimes In Bangladesh: A legal Response to Critics".

The Liberation War Museum hosted the lecture at its Segun Bagicha office.

Mentioning the shortcomings of international and hybrid courts, Rafiqul Islam showed that many of these tribunals stumbled due to financial crisis and failed to deliver justice to victims speedily.

He said Bangladesh had provided a valuable lesson for harmonious functioning of complementarity with international jurisdiction and effective forum for victims to seek justice, witnesses to give evidence where impunity prevailed for decades.

He, however, criticised the tribunal for giving lesser punishment to war crimes mastermind Ghulam Azam, former chief of the Jamaat-e-Islami.

He said the tribunal lessened his punishment taking the example from International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) where the punishment of a criminal was mitigated because of old age and that criminal "displayed profound remorse" to the community.

“Ghulam Azam never expressed remorse to Bangladeshis. That is why his age alone should not have been decisive criteria for the reduction of his punishment,” he opined.

Pointing out the contribution of the ICT, the professor said it has created precedential value through civic and judicial responses to militant communal fanaticism-induced criminality that outraged humanity in 1971. He further said in this era of violent terrorism, the tribunal was significant to militate against poisonous ideological hatred and radicalism.

Until the last two executions, defence or war criminals believed that the tribunal and the government would submit to unethical overwhelming pressure both nationally and internationally by their lobbyists, he said.

But when they see Bangladesh, like 1971, is resolute in its course of action despite all the criticism, they perhaps have now realised "arrogance will bring no dividend"; that is why they for the first time raised the age factor for the reduction of punishment, he added.

War crimes convict Motiur Rahman Nizami's lawyer recently prayed to the appellate court to take into consideration his "age" if he is found guilty.