A special tribunal in Bangladesh has sentenced a leader of the opposition Jamaat-e-Islami party to death for allegedly committing atrocities during the country’s 1971 war of independence from Pakistan.
Delwar Hossain Sayedee, vice-president of the party, was convicted on Thursday of genocide, rape and religious persecution.
Meanwhile, a nationwide strike called by Jaamat-e-Islami to protest what it called politically motivated trials of its entire leadership, including its chief and his deputy leader, has left much of Bangladesh paralysed.
Earlier this month the International Crimes Tribunal, a local court, sentenced Jamaat’s assistant secretary general Abdul Quader Molla to life imprisonment, sparking deadly protests by Islamists that left 16 people dead.
The verdict also enraged secular protesters, tens of thousands of whom have since poured onto a central Dhaka intersection to reject the “lighter sentence” and demand the execution of Jamaat leaders.
Aljazeera
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