Death warrants issued for SQ Chy, Mojaheed

A war crimes tribunal today issued death warrants for BNP leader Salauddin Quader Chowdhury and Jamaat-e-Islami leader Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed.

Registrar office of the International Crimes Tribunal issued the death warrants a day after it received the copies of the full judgments released by the Supreme Court upholding the death penalty of Mojaheed and Salauddin for committing crimes during the country’s Liberation War in 1971.

The warrants would be sent to the jail authorities and its copies will be forwarded to district magistrates concerned, and both home and law ministries soon, said Shahidul Alam, registrar of the tribunal.

The process will initiate process for execution of the two condemned war criminals.

Around 2:57pm, a four-member delegation led by Pervez Alam, senior law researcher of war crimes tribunal, took the death warrants to Dhaka’s prison superintendent.

Sixty-seven-year-old Mojaheed is now in Dhaka Central Jail while sixty-six-year-old Salauddin is in Kashimpur Jail-1.

In two judgments in June and July this year, the SC affirmed the death penalty of Mojaheed and Salauddin after hearing their appeals against the verdicts of two international crimes tribunals that awarded them capital punishment around two years ago for committing crimes against humanity.

Following the full verdicts, counsels for both Mojaheed and Salauddin, yesterday said their clients would seek review within the 15-day deadline after going through the full verdicts.

According to Attorney General Mahbubey Alam, the SC is likely to hear the review petitions after it reopens on November 1, as there is no urgency to hear those during the vacation.           

The attorney general, however, said there was urgency to hear such petitions, and the apex court could hold the hearing during vacation if it wishes. The SC went on a 44-day annual vacation on September 18 and will reopen on November 1.