UK concerned over plans to execute Molla

The UK has expressed “concerns” over the plans to execute war crimes convict Abdul Quader Molla.

“I am deeply concerned at reports of plans to execute (him) in the coming days,” British Senior Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Sayeeda Hussain Warsi said on Tuesday.

She will come to Dhaka on Thursday amid ongoing political crisis.

“The UK opposes the death penalty in all circumstances as a matter of principle,” she said.

The British minister was in Dhaka in February and had talks with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Leader of the Opposition Khaleda Zia and Foreign Minister Dipu Moni on the election issue.

Baroness Warsi added that they considered that the death sentence “undermines human dignity and that there is no conclusive evidence of its deterrent value”.

“We further note that (Molla) was sentenced to death following an appeal permitted under retrospectively applied legislation, and that he was not permitted to review his sentence before the Supreme Court,” she said in a statement hours before the execution.

The British Senior Minister said Bangladesh’s commitments under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) “require that all citizens be treated equally before the law”.

“The UK calls again for Bangladesh to implement a moratorium on the death penalty leading to the eventual abolition of the death penalty,” she said in a statement.

Dhaka Central Jail authorities earlier said Molla’s death sentence would be carried out at 12:01am on Wednesday.

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.