Dhaka – Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami has announced a day-long strike across Bangladesh for Monday to protest the execution of its secretary general Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid over crimes he committed during the country’s 1971 war of liberation from Pakistan.
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BNP leader Salauddin’s family told reporters that they would write to the President arguing that his trial had not been fair. While the ruling Awami League has been enthusiastic in prosecuting people involved with war crimes as part of its secular political message, right wing parties such as the Bangladesh Nationalist Part and the Jamaat-e-Islami have been bitterly opposed to this. The Supreme Court had beforehand rejected their appeals towards a demise sentence imposed by a particular tribunal for genocide and torture of civilians through the battle.
The families of Chowdhury and Mujahid met them for the last time inside the Dhaka Central Jail on Saturday evening before the planned executions, authorities said.
In light of the executions, Bangladeshi authorities have tightened security in capital Dhaka and elsewhere in the country.
Bangladesh executed two opposition leaders for war crimes committed during the 1971 war to break away from Pakistan, a senior police official said.
“They have been hanged together, at the same time”, Kabir said.
The executions followed the rejection of mercy pleas of the two leaders by President Abdul Hamid.
Bangladesh’s war crimes tribunals found the leaders guilty of collaborating with Pakistani forces and committing war crimes, including mass killings. Two senior leaders of Jamaat-e-Islami have already been executed.
The trial was “predetermined” with the country “gagged from speaking out”, Salauddin Quader Chowdhury’s son Humam told the Reuters news agency.
“As emphasized earlier, we have also been noting the reaction of the worldwide community on the flawed trials in Bangladesh related to events of 1971”, he said.
In a statement on Sunday the foreign office spokesman, Qazi Khalilullah reminded Bangladesh government of 1974 treaty in which India, Pakistan and Bangladesh agreed to disperse the situation by reconcile matters related to 1971 war in Bangladesh.
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News of the executions comes as Bangladesh has been reeling under a string of terror attacks, beginning with the killing of four secular bloggers and a publisher this year by a Islamic fundamentalist group inspired by the writings of al-Qaeda.
