Law minister for changes to constitution

Law Minister Anisul Huq yesterday underscored the need for an amendment to the Constitution so that convicted war criminals cannot get presidential clemency.
“It is no possible for us to accept in future that a president of Bangladesh pardons a convict of the 1971 crimes against humanity exercising article 49 of the Constitution,” he said while talking to reporters after inaugurating a training course of the joint district judges at BIAM auditorium in the capital.
The article 49 of the Constitution says: “The President shall have power to grant pardons, reprieves and respites and to remit, suspend or commute any sentence passed by any court, tribunal or other authority.”
The law minister told The Daily Star that it could not be ensured that the convicted war criminals would not get presidential mercy in future.
“I will raise the issue before the policymakers of the government and discuss with them how a provision can be incorporated in the Constitution prohibiting president's mercy for convicted war criminals,” he said.
The minister apprehends that someone like former president Abdur Rahman Biswas might pardon war crimes convicts such as Jamaat-e-Islami leader Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed.
He said the draft amendment to the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) Act might be placed for approval before the cabinet at its November 3 meeting with a new provision to try and punish war criminal organisations.
The move comes in light of making Jamaat, an organisation the International Crimes Tribunal has termed guilty of crimes committed during the Liberation War, face trial for its role in 1971.
In response to a query, the minister said the government would take a decision to file a review plea on the life imprisonment of Jamaat leader Delawar Hossain Sayedee after obtaining the full verdict of the review of the death penalty of Abdul Quader Molla.
The government would also move to ensure that the war criminals did not get presidential mercy in future, he added.
He has hinted at amending the Constitution to that end, if need be.
A faction of Ganajagaran Mancha submitted a memorandum to the minister on Sunday demanding scrapping the provision for presidential clemency for war criminals.
It also demanded filing a review petition of war crimes convict Delawar Hossain Sayedee's life-in-jail term and trying Jamaat-e-Islami as a party for its role in the war.
The secular platform seeks maximum penalty for convicted war criminals.
The minister said the very thought of Bangladesh's president letting off people convicted of crimes against humanity gave him a shiver.
"But we've seen that [war criminal Ali Ahsan Mohammad] Mojaheed and [war crimes accused Jamaat chief Motiur Rahman] Nizami had become ministers.
"The entire process of war crimes trial will be destroyed if any president shows the courage to forgive any war criminal in future.
"There can be no compromise over this process [war crimes trial]. We must ensure punishment for the 1971 atrocities. We have to ensure that the war criminals do not get off the hook by any means," the minister added.