Two witnesses give testimony

Two prosecution witnesses yesterday testified that they had learned about torture of a former vice-chancellor by war crimes accused Salauddin Quader Chowdhury at Goods Hill during the Liberation War in 1971 as they were the victim's neighbours.
They said this during cross-examination by the defence before the International Crimes Tribunal-1.
In Monday's deposition, the 25th and 26th prosecution witnesses -- Abu Taher Chowdhury and Mohammad Solaiman -- said Saleh Uddin, former VC of Shahjalal University of Science and Technology, was abducted from Rajakhan Chowdhury's house at Mohora village under Chandgaon police station in Chittagong.
He was confined to SQ Chowdhury's father Fazlul Quader Chowdhury's 'Goods Hill' residence and was tortured by the war crimes accused and others, the witnesses said.
They added they had heard it from Saleh Uddin after he was freed.
Defence counsel Ahsanul Haque Hena yesterday asked both the witnesses how they had learned about the abduction.
The witnesses said they had learned it as Saleh Uddin was Abdul Motaleb Chowdhury's house tutor and lived in their neighbourhood.
Saying that Saleh Uddin was a residential student of Alawal Hall at Chittagong University, the defence counsel said he had stayed at the dormitory during the war.
However, both the witnesses said the victim had lived at Abdul Motaleb Chowdhury's house then.
Earlier, the three-member tribunal adjourned hearing of the defence argument until April 11 as Abdur Razzaq, chief defence counsel for war crimes accused Jamaat leaders, who was supposed to place argument on law points in Ghulam Azam's case, failed to appear before the court.
Defence counsel Raihan Uddin told the tribunal that Razzaq could not come due to “personal difficulty”.
The defence counsel in his verbal submission prayed to the tribunal to adjourn the proceeding for three days as pro-Jamaat student group Islami Chhatra Shibir called hartal for tomorrow.
Allowing the prayer for two days including yesterday, tribunal chairman Justice ATM Fazle Kabir told Raihan that they believed Razzaq would be able to appear before the tribunal since tomorrow's hartal was called by Shibir.
Raihan however kept requesting the tribunal to adjourn the proceeding until April 15.
Mentioning that the tribunal had earlier extended time and adjourned proceeding on several occasions due to the defence's “personal difficulty”, tribunal member Justice Jahangir Hossain Selim said, “We have nothing to say if you are not satisfied even after that.”