Bangladesh court orders former leader Hasina be executed

DHAKA, Bangladesh: A Bangladesh court, after convicting former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of crimes against humanity, has sentenced her to death, bringing to an end, a months-long trial that found she ordered a deadly crackdown on a student-led uprising last year. The ruling comes just months before parliamentary elections expected in early February. Under the law used by the tribunal, the maximum punishment was the death penalty. Hasina's Awami League party has been barred from running in the election, and many fear that Monday's verdict could spark new unrest before the vote. The International Crimes Tribunal — Bangladesh's domestic war crimes court based in Dhaka — delivered the verdict under heavy security and in Hasina's absence, as she fled to India in August 2024. The verdict can still be appealed in the Supreme Court. However, Hasina's son and adviser, Sajeeb Wazed, told Reuters the day before the ruling that they would not appeal unless a democratically elected government takes office with the Awami League's participation. During the trial, prosecutors said they had found evidence that Hasina directly ordered security forces to use lethal force to crush the student uprising in July and August 2024. A United Nations report said up to 1,400 people may have been killed between July 15 and August 5, 2024, and thousands more injured — most of them shot by security forces — in what was the worst violence in Bangladesh since the 1971 war of independence. Hasina was represented by a state-appointed defence lawyer, who told the court the charges were baseless and asked for her acquittal. Before the verdict, Hasina denied the accusations and questioned whether the Tribunal was fair, saying a guilty verdict was "a foregone conclusion." Bangladesh had been on edge before the ruling, with at least 30 crude bomb blasts and 26 vehicles set on fire across the country in recent days. There have been no casualties so far.