B’desh SC Upholds Death Sentence Of BNP Leader Salauddin Quader Chowdhury

29 July, Dhaka

Bangladesh Supreme Court today upheld the death sentence of Bangladesh Nationalist Party leader Salauddin Quader Chowdhury for crimes against humanity during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War. A four-member bench of the appellate division led by Chief Justice Surendra Sinha delivered the verdict Wednesday.

He is the first BNP leader to have the death sentence upheld by the top court. The court upheld death in 4 charges, and 20 years imprisonment in 3 charges.

The 66-year old six-time MP from Chittagong, and a former Minister in the Khaleda Zia-led BNP-Jamaat coalition government of 2001-2006 was sentenced to death by the International Crimes Tribunal on October 1st 2013, on 9 charges of war crimes including genocide of Hindus, abduction, confinement, torture and murder of Awami League supporters.

After being arrested on December, 16, 2010, Salauddin Chowdhury, known as the war-terror of Chittagong, was lodged in Kashimpur jail in Gazipur.

He is the second former Minister of Bangladesh to have the death sentence upheld by the top court, the other being Jamaat-e-islami leader Ali Hasan Mujahid.

The International Crimes Tribunals have tried the cases of several war criminals since they were set by the Hasina government in 2010, almost 40 years after the Liberation War which left an estimated 3 million dead and over 3 lakh women raped. 2 leaders of the Jamaat-e-Islami were executed for crimes in 2013 and 2015 respectively.