Tribunal adjourns hearing till Aug 24 as Sayedee sick in custody
Dhaka, Aug 10 (UNB) - As detained Jamaat leader Delwar Hossain Sayedee, a war crimes–suspect, could not be produced before the International Crimes Tribunal due to sickness, the hearing was held back for 13 days.
On August 4, the tribunal issued a production warrant against Jamaat-e-Islami nayeb-e-ameer Sayedee and asked the Dhaka central jail authority to produce him before it today (Tuesday).
Minutes after the tribunal began the day’s proceedings, Chief Prosecutor Golam Arif Tipu, after getting information from the tribunal about the sickness of Sayedee, prayed for adjournment which was not opposed by the defense counsel.
Issuing a fresh production warrant against Sayedee, the tribunal set August 24 for the next date of hearing.
A member of the tribunal, retired district judge AKM Zaheer Ahmed also did not attend the day’s sitting of the 3-member tribunal because of illness, tribunal sources said.
“The prison authority has informed that the suspected person Delwar Hossain Sayedee alias Delu is indisposed and as such he cannot be produced before the tribunal,” tribunal chairman Justice M Nizamul Huq, flanked by Justice ATM Fazle Kabir, told both the prosecution and the defense counsel present.
During this brief period, the defense counsel for Sayedee submitted two applications the tribunal’s permission to allow his client execute letter of authority engaging lawyers and to recall the production warrant against his client.
About the six pending applications submitted by the defense counsel involving “question of law,” the tribunal said that all the matters would be heard on August 24.
The defense applications include seeking stay of all further proceedings of the tribunal, sending back the records of the cases filed with Pallabi and Keraniganj police stations against Motiur Rahman Nizami, Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid, Mohammad Qamaruzzaman and Abdul Quader Molla - the four top Jamaat-e-Islami leaders, to the Dhaka CMM Court, and the release of all the five war crimes-suspects.
All the five accused Jamaat leaders are facing charges under section 3(2) of the International Crimes Tribunal Act 1973 for genocide, murder, rape, torture, loot and arson during the Bangladesh liberation war in 1971.
