Law Week
Acquittal of 6 Army Men Challenged
The government on Thursday filed a concise statement with the Supreme Court for hearing a pending appeal in the jail killing case. Attorney General's Office filed the statement alleging that the 2008 High Court verdict acquitting six former army personnel was done without proper examination of documents and evidence. In the statement, the government prayed to the apex court to uphold the lower court verdict, which had found all the six army personnel guilty. The Attorney General's Office will pray to the Appellate Division on Sunday to fix a date for hearing the appeal against the HC verdict. Principal state counsel for the case Anisul Huq on Wednesday sent the statement to the Attorney General's Office to file it with the SC. The HC in its verdict on August 28, 2008 acquitted the six former military personnel from the charge of killing four national leaders -- Syed Nazrul Islam, Tajuddin Ahmad, AHM Qamruzzaman, and Captain Mansur Ali -- inside the Dhaka Central Jail on November 3, 1975. All of these army personnel were found guilty at the lower court on October 20, 2004. Two of them were given death sentence and the rest life-term imprisonment. Capital punishment was handed down on Dafadar (dismissed) Marfat Ali Shah and Dafadar (dismissed) Abdul Hashem Mridha. They both are absconding. The four sentenced to life-term were Lt Col (dismissed) Syed Farooq-ur Rahman, Lt Col (retd) Sultan Shahriar Rashid Khan, Maj (retd) AKM Mohiuddin Ahmed and Maj (retd) Bazlul Huda. They were executed on January 27, 2010 in the Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman assassination case. The lower court in 2004 also gave life-term to eight others. The High Court however did not say anything about them in 2008. -The Daily Star, 1 November 2012.
Arms brought for Ulfa
A prosecution witness in the sensational 10-truck arms haul cases yesterday told a court here that the arms cache was brought for the Indian separatist organisation United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA). Making his second deposition before the Chittagong Metropolitan Special Tribunal-1 in the cases, former habildar of Bandar police outpost Golam Rasul said ex-NSI official Maj (retd) Liakat Hossain and “smuggler” Hafizur Rhaman had informed him about the matter. The law enforcers had detained five suspected Ulfa activists in this connection, but later released them following an order by the then state minister for home Lutfuzzaman Babar, said court sources quoting the witness. Rasul said while on duty at the outpost on April 1, 2004, he received a phone call around 10:45pm. The caller told him that some illegal goods were being unloaded at the jetty of Chittagong Urea Fertiliser Limited (CUFL). “When I asked the caller about his identity, he cut off the phone line. I informed sergeant Alauddin about the matter, and we two left for the jetty. After reaching there, we saw many people, two trawlers loaded with boxes, about eight trucks and a crane. The boxes were being unloaded by the crane.” Asked about the unloaded boxes, the workers said there were machinery parts inside them. On April 2, 2004, around 1,500 wooden boxes containing submachine guns, AK-47 assault rifles, submachine carbines, Chinese pistols, rocket shells and launchers, hand grenades and bullets were seized from two vessels at the jetty of CUFL. Two cases were filed the next day with Karnaphuli Police Station under the Special Powers Act and arms act for smuggling and seizure of arms. Trial in the cases got underway on November 29 last year. -The Daily Star, 1 November 2012.
5 indicted for killing Khalaf
A Dhaka court yesterday framed charges against five accused in the Saudi embassy official Khalaf Al Ali murder case. Judge Mohammad Motahar Hossain of Speedy Trial Tribunal-4 also fixed today for starting the trial of the case. The court summoned Sub-Inspector Mosharraf Hossain of Gulshan Police Station, also complainant of the case, to appear before it today and narrate what he knows about the incident. Four of the accused, Mohammad Al Amin, Saiful Islam Mamun, Rafiqul Islam Khokon and Akbar Ali Lalu, now in police custody, claimed themselves innocent of the murder and demanded justice when the charges were read out to them. The four also told the court that they were arrested in connection with another case. However, they were later shown arrested in the Saudi official murder case and forced to give confessional statements before magistrates. The court framed charges against another accused Selim Chowdhury and issued an arrest warrant against him. Selim is on the run. Khalaf, 45, an official at the consular section of the Saudi embassy in Dhaka, was shot dead near his Gulshan house in the capital's diplomatic enclave in the small hours of March 6 this year. -The Daily Star, 1 November 2012.
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