Bangladesh ex-PM Sheikh Hasina sentenced to death for ‘crimes against humanity’

Former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was on Monday sentenced to death after the country’s International Crimes Tribunal found her guilty of crimes against humanity for the deadly crackdown on the protests against her government in 2024.

The verdict was the first in a series of four cases related to crimes allegedly committed during her government’s response to the several weeks of widespread student-led protests against the Awami League government in July and August 2024.

Hasina, however, described the tribunal as biased and politically motivated, and denied having ordered firing on protestors.

In its judgement, the tribunal said that the attacks during last year’s protests were “directed against the civilian population” and were “widespread and systematic”.

“In the atrocities of killing and gravely injuring protesters…accused Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina committed crimes against humanity by her incitement order and also failure to take preventive and punitive measures…,” Judge Golam Mortuza Mozumder said.

Mozumder added that Hasina committed “crimes against humanity by her order to use drones, helicopters and lethal weapons.”

Hasina was tried by the tribunal in absentia. She was sentenced alongside former home minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal and former police chief Abdullah al-Mamun.

The Bangladesh tribunal court also handed down a death sentence to Kamal, while al-Mamun was sentenced to five years of jail.

Among the accused, only al-Mamun was present in court for the sentencing.

Amid the protests in 2024, Hasina had resigned as the prime minister and fled to India on August 5. She had been in power for 16 years. Nobel laureate economist Muhammad Yunus took over as the head of Bangladesh’s interim government three days later.

The interim government has said it will investigate Hasina in connection with allegations that she ordered the killings and enforced disappearances of dissidents during the protests against her government in July and August 2024.

A total of 51 cases have been filed against her, including 42 for murder. Two warrants for her arrest have also been issued.

Hasina has denied the allegations and claimed that she is being politically persecuted.

In an interview to AFP in October, Hasina described the trial a “jurisprudential joke” and added that she believed a guilty verdict was “preordained”.

In the current case, Hasina and two others faced five charges inciting violence through speeches, ordering the use of lethal weapons to suppress the protests and directly causing the deaths of civilians, including the killing of a student of Begum Rokeya University in Rangpur, Prothom Alo reported.

The prosecution argued that Hasina was the mastermind behind the actions.

In February, a United Nations report on the violence said that the Hasina government, the country’s security and intelligence services and “violent elements” associated with her Awami League party had “systematically engaged in a range of serious human rights violations” during the agitation in 2024.

Of the 1,400 killed and thousands injured between July 1, 2024, and August 15, 2024, the vast majority were shot by Bangladesh’s security forces, the UN report said. Of these, 12% to 13% killed were children.

In July, Hasina was indicted by the tribunal for crimes against humanity allegedly committed during the protests.

On July 2, the tribunal sentenced Hasina to six months in prison for contempt of court over her remarks that were considered to obstruct judicial proceedings. This was the first time that she had been sentenced in any case since she fled the country.

‘Rigged tribunal’: Sheikh Hasina on verdict

Responding to the verdict on Monday, Hasina said that it was made by “rigged tribunal” that had been established and presided over by an “unelected government with no democratic mandate”.

“They are biased and politically motivated,” she said in a statement released by the Awami League. “In their distasteful call for the death penalty, they reveal the brazen and murderous intent of extremist figures within the interim government to remove Bangladesh’s last elected prime minister, and to nullify the Awami League as a political force.”

Hasina said that Bangladeshis “toiling under the chaotic, violent and socially-regressive administration of Dr Mohammad Yunus will not be fooled by this attempt to short-change them” of their democratic rights.

The former prime minister added that the trials conducted by the International Crimes Tribunal was to “scapegoat” the Awami League and to “distract” the world from the failings of the interim government.

Denying the charges made against her by the tribunal, Hasina said that she nor other leaders under her Awami League government ordered the killing of the protesters in July and August 2024.

The former prime minister added that she was not given a fair chance to defend herself in court, or to have her lawyers represent her in absentia.

“Its [the tribunal’s] guilty verdict against me was a foregone conclusion,” the statement read. “...There is no other motive than the personal pursuit of revenge against a democratically elected government that upheld the nation’s independence and sovereignty.”

Hasina said that she repeatedly asked the interim government to bring the charges against her before the International Criminal Court in the Hague. “The interim government will not accept this challenge, because it knows that the ICC would acquit me,” she added.

The former prime minister claimed that Yunus had come to power unconstitutionally and with the support of “extremist elements”.

Hasina also said that the actions taken by her government in July and August 2024 was to “try to stem the disorder”, adding that the leaders acted in good faith and were trying to minimise the loss of life.

“We lost control of the situation, but to characterise what happened as a premeditated assault on citizens is simply to misread the facts,” the statement read.

Hasina said that the “UN’s much-quoted fatality estimate of 1,400 deaths is also disputed”, adding that the Bangladesh’s Ministry of Health recorded a verified count of 834 deaths.

“The higher number seemingly includes unverified cases supplied by the National Security Intelligence and counts among the dead police officers and Awami League activists murdered by protesters,” she said. “But only 614 families have received state assistance as families of martyrs.”

Citing investigations conducted by newspapers, Hasnia added that 52 of those killed died from illness, accidents, or other unrelated causes. About 19 others reported dead were later found alive, she said.