Thousands protest over war crimes tribunal

Bangladesh: Thousands protest over war crimes tribunal

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14 February 2013 Last updated at 20:08 GMTHelp

Hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets in Bangladesh in protest over sentences handed out in relation to alleged war crimes during the 1971 war of independence.

It took decades for a tribunal to be set up to look at the atrocities committed at that time, and the first verdicts came this year, including the conviction of a senior leader of Bangladesh's biggest Islamic party.

A former leader from Jamaat-e-Islami was sentenced to death in absentia. Another leader, Abdul Kader Mullah, was given a life sentence last week.

Some protesters feel the sentences have been too lenient, or that the process has been flawed.

Meanwhile, supporters of Jamaat-e-Islami held separate protests calling for Mullah's release.

Some in Bangladesh say that public protests could put unnecessary pressure on judges presiding over the tribunal.

The BBC's Anbarasan Ethirajan reports from Dhaka.

In Bangladesh, demands grow for execution of man convicted of war crimes during 1971 conflict

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/02/16/in-bangladesh-demands-grow-for-execution-man-convicted-war-crimes-during-171/

Published February 16, 2013

Associated Press

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FILE - In this Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2013 file photo, Bangladeshi activists participate in a rally demanding the execution of Jamaat-e-Islami leader Abdul Quader Mollah and others convicted of war crimes in Dhaka, Bangladesh. For many in Bangladesh, the ''V'' for victory sign was more than they could bear. They had waited more than four decades for justice in the mass killings and rapes during their independence war. But there was a smiling Mollah apparently celebrating his life sentence - given in place of an expected death sentence - for his role in the killing of 381 civilians. Within hours, thousands of university students demanding his death poured into the streets of Dhaka, the seeds of what has grown into a mass protest that has exposed again the unhealed wounds from the nation's 1971 war for independence from Pakistan. (AP Photo/A.M. Ahad, File) (The Associated Press)

DHAKA, Bangladesh –  For many in Bangladesh, the "V'' for victory sign was more than they could bear.
They had waited more than four decades for justice in the mass killings and rapes during their independence war. But there was a smiling Abdul Quader Mollah apparently celebrating his life sentence — given in place of an expected death sentence — for his role in the killing of 381 civilians.
Within hours, thousands of university students demanding his death poured into the streets of Dhaka, the seeds of what has grown into a mass protest that has exposed again the unhealed wounds from the nation's 1971 war for independence from Pakistan.
"I could not take it. That was really insulting," Gazi Nasiruddin Khokon, a protester who works for an online newspaper, said of Mollah's victorious gesture after his sentencing last week. "If we don't get proper justice for such crimes, where would we stand in the future?"
Mollah was convicted by a special war crimes tribunal that was set up to hold people accountable for the first time for their roles in the civil war, where Bangladesh says as many as 3 million people were killed and 200,000 women raped by Pakistani troops and local collaborators.
But the trials are also seen as part of a long and bitter rivalry between Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and the main opposition leader, former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, who is allied with the Islamic party Jamaat-e-Islami, many of whose leaders face charges before the tribunal.
Jamaat, which opposed Bangladesh's fight for independence, and Zia have called the tribunal politically motivated, while international rights groups have raised questions about the conduct of the trials. The head of one of the tribunals resigned in December over reports he had improper conversations with a lawyer about the panel.
Mollah, an assistant secretary of Jamaat, was found guilty Feb. 5 of killing a student and a family of 11 and of aiding Pakistani troops in killing 369 others. Members of his party took to the streets in anger at his conviction, exploding homemade bombs and clashing with police.
But they were soon overshadowed by thousands of protesters who flooded a major intersection in the capital, Dhaka, upset at what they said was a lenient verdict and inflamed by the image of Mollah smiling at journalists and holding up two fingers in a "V'' sign as he left the court.
Fueled by online posts, the protests grew until hundreds of thousands of people took over the Shahbagh intersection, which they renamed Projonmo Chattar, or New Generation Platform.
Many slept there, collecting donations for food. Others came after work and stayed late into the night, listening to chants for justice over loudspeakers. Some beat drums and wrapped their heads in scarves with slogans saying "We want death for the war criminals" and "Traitors have no place in this land."
The protesters also called for Jamaat to be banned.
The immensely popular national cricket team came to the site to express solidarity with the protesters, and on Thursday evening, organizers said more than 100,000 candles were lit at the site.
To counter any accusations that the protest was organized by Hasina's government, politicians were banned from the stage.
"This is a history. A new history is in the making," said Aminul Islam, a 30-year-old bank employee at the protest site.
"It is unbelievable," he said. "This is our fight, this is another war, not with rifles in hand, but with an unconditional urge to bringing those to book for killing our people and dishonoring our mothers and sisters."
Even though many of the protesters had not been born when the war raged, they were still scarred by it and the lack of accountability for those accused of crimes during the fighting, said Hassan Shahriar. To some that lack of accountability was reflected in the fact two members of Jamaat have served as cabinet ministers.
"Generation after generation have seen no remedy, no punishment for the perpetrators. Rather they have become influential political actors, social actors, and the new generation has been silently frustrated," he said. "The wounds are still fresh."
The protesters are also fed up with corruption, nepotism and other perceived injustices and have seized on the tribunals to express their dissatisfaction, he said.
In response to the demonstrations, the government sent a bill to Parliament that would amend the law creating the tribunals, allowing the prosecution to appeal if it felt a sentence handed down was too lenient.
Law Minister Shafique Ahmed said the bill is expected to be passed by Parliament on Sunday, and the government has said it would use it to appeal Mollah's sentence.
One legal analyst, Shahdeen Malik, said the amendments would strengthen the law, and that the country's legal system could be counted on to give verdicts based on evidence and not simply in response to street pressure.
But New York-based Human Rights Watch criticized the proposed amendments, saying that passing retroactive laws to overturn unpopular verdicts violated the country's commitments to protect the rights of defendants.
"Convictions of those responsible for the 1971 atrocities is important for the country, but not at the expense of the principles that make Bangladesh a democracy," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

People attend a mass funeral as the body of Rajib Haider, an architect and blogger who was a key figure in organising demonstrations, arrives at Shahbagh intersection in Dhaka February 16, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Andrew Biraj

Blogger's death rekindles anti-Islamist protests in Bangladesh

http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/02/16/bangladesh-protest-idINDEE91F02E20130216

By Anis Ahmed

DHAKA | Sat Feb 16, 2013 7:33pm IST

DHAKA (Reuters) - More than 100,000 Bangladeshi protesters, angered by the killing of one of their leaders, poured back onto the streets of the capital on Saturday to demand the death penalty for those found guilty of war crimes in the 1971 independence conflict.

The demonstrators, who denounced a life sentence handed down this month on an Islamist leader involved in the war, reversed a decision to scale back demonstrations, now in their 12th day.

Rajib Haider, an architect, was a key figure in organising the demonstrations and wrote a blog devoted to them under the pen name Thaba baba. He was attacked outside his home on Friday night after returning from a 100,000-strong rally in Shahbag Square.

On Saturday, an even larger crowd thronged the square to attend funeral prayers for Haider, many vowing to avenge his death or breaking down in tears as his coffin passed.

Haider's family told reporters they believed he was stabbed to death for standing up to the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party and drawing people to the protests. Police said they had detained five suspects.

"Haider's death has rekindled our spirits," said Nasiruddin Yusuf, a film-maker. "It will not go in vain."

Large protests gripped other cities. Security forces patrolled streets in much greater numbers than in previous days.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina visited Haider's home and told his grieving parents justice would be done.

"Rajib Haider's killers have no right to do politics," she said in comments broadcast live on television. She said Jamaat and its affiliates "do not believe in democracy. They believe in terrorism. That is what they are proving again."

The protests were triggered by the life sentence imposed on Abdul Quader Mollah, assistant secretary-general of Jamaat, Bangladesh's largest Islamist party. Most Bangladeshis had expected a death sentence on charges of murder, rape and torture.

PROTESTERS VOW TO REMAIN

Protest leaders vowed to remain on the street until Mollah, 64, is sentenced to death, along with others convcted of committing crimes during the war.

Some say they would accept parliamentary amendments to provide for stiffer penalties to be issued by the war crimes tribunal, set up in 2010 by Hasina, daughter of independence leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

"The young generation is shining a light on the spirit of the liberation war we fought more than 40 years ago," said Dhaka University professor Abul Barakat, 58. "We couldn't achieve all the dreams of the war. Now, perhaps no one can stop them."

In its first verdict last month, the tribunal sentenced a former Jamaat leader, Abul Kalam Azad, to death. Azad was tried in absentia as he fled the country last April.

State minister for law Qamrul Islam, shown on television addressing a rally near Dhaka, said the disbanding of Jamaat "is a public demand. It's just a matter of time when Jamaat will be banned from politics."

The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) of Hasina's arch rival, former premier Begum Khaleda Zia, says the prime minister is using the tribunal as a political weapon. Hasina denies the accusation.

Bangladesh became part of Pakistan at the end of British rule in 1947 but broke away in 1971 after a war between Bangladeshi nationalists, backed by India, and Pakistani forces. Three million people died and thousands of women were raped.

Some factions in what was then East Pakistan opposed the break with Pakistan. Jamaat denies accusations that it opposed independence and helped the Pakistani army.

(Reporting by Anis Ahmed and Serajul Quadir; Editing by Ron Popeski)