Quader Molla to hang after midnight

War crimes convict Abdul Quader Molla will be hanged by ‘tonight’, State Minister for Home Shamsul Hoque Tuku has said.

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 10 Dec 2013, 01:58 PM
Updated : 10 Dec 2013, 04:12 PM

All preparations to execute the Jamaat-e-Islami Assistant Secretary General have been completed, he told reporters on Tuesday.

Dhaka Central Jail Senior Superintendent Farman Ali told reporters around 8pm that the death sentence would be carried out at 12:01am on Wednesday.

Fifteen minutes before that, 23 members of Molla’s family, including his wife Sanoara Jahan, arrived at the jail to meet him.

The family went to meet Molla for the last time in two microbuses after the prison authorities wrote to them to do so by 8pm.

Earlier in the evening, State Minister for Law Qamrul Islam told mediapersons that the Jamaat leader had refused to seek presidential pardon, though the option was open to him.

Molla's lawyers had met him in the day.

Chief defence counsel Abdur Razzaq had said Molla only directed them to file a plea for the review of the Supreme Court's full verdict.

The International Crimes Tribunal had on Sunday issued the death warrant for Molla, soon after receiving a copy of the full version of the Supreme Court verdict sentencing Molla to death.

Bangladesh's second war crimes tribunal had on Feb 5 sentenced Molla to life imprisonment for killings, rapes and looting during the War of Independence in 1971.

Perceived to be too lenient a penalty, the prosecution moved the Supreme Court against the verdict. The highest court, on Oct 17, revised the life term to a death sentence.