Senior member of Bangladesh Islamic party sentenced to death by war crimes tribunal

A leading member of Bangladesh’s largest Islamic party has been sentenced to death by a tribunal dealing with war crimes involving the 1971 war of independence with Pakistan.

Abdus Subhan, 79, of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, was convicted of crimes including mass killing, arson and looting.

The head judge of a three-member panel, Obaidul Hasan, delivered the verdict in a packed courtroom in the nation’s capital, Dhaka.

Subhan is the ninth senior leader of the party to be convicted of such crimes since prime minister Sheikh Hasina initiated the war crimes trials in 2010.

One party leader has already been hanged for similar crimes.

Subhan faced nine charges that included the killing of 400 people in several villages in northern Bangladesh.

The defence said it would appeal.

Bangladesh blames Pakistani soldiers and local collaborators for the deaths of 3 million people during the nine-month war.

An estimated 200,000 women were raped and about 10 million people were forced to take shelter in refugee camps in neighbouring India.

After Bangladesh gained independence, there was a process to try the suspects, but it was thwarted following the assassination of then-president and independence leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman – Ms Hasina’s father – and most of his family members in a 1975 military coup.