Violent clashes in Bangladesh after execution of Jamaat-e-Islami leader

In Bangladesh, violent clashes erupted Wednesday after authorities executed the leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami Party for crimes committed during the war of independence with Pakistan in 1971.

Selim Badsah, a regional police inspector, said riot police fired rubber bullets to disperse supporters of Motiur Rahman Nizami, hundreds in number, in the northwestern city of Rajshahi.

"There were 500 Jamaat activists who were protesting the execution. We fired rubber bullets as they became violent."

The police official added that about 20 protesters were detained during the riot.

Separately, Jamaat-e-Islami and ruling party supporters clashed in the port city of Chittagong, where about 2,500 people attended a service for the executed leader.

Bangladeshi law enforcement agencies have stepped up security in Nizami's ancestral district of Pabna, where his body was taken under armed escort for burial in his family's grave.

Local police inspector Ahsanul Haq said police have arrested several people across Pabna over the past 24 hours, adding, "At least 16 activists of Jamaat were arrested (in Pabna) Tuesday night as part of the security clampdown."

Meanwhile, security forces remain on high alert across Bangladesh amid fears of violent protests over the execution. Authorities have also deployed thousands of troops in the capital, Dhaka, and some other cities to prevent incidents of violence.

According to Bangladesh’s Law and Justice Minister Anisul Huq, 73-year-old Nizami was hanged at a jail in Dhaka “between 11:50 p.m. and 12:00 a.m.” local time on May 10, a week after he lost a final appeal to overturn the death sentence.

Nizami is the fifth high-profile party member to have been executed since the government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina set up a war crimes tribunal in 2010.

On May 5, the Supreme Court of Bangladesh rejected Nizami’s last appeal against the death sentence, which was endorsed by the court on January 6. In October 2014, he was found guilty by the International Crimes Tribunal over charges of murder, rape and orchestrating the killing of top intellectuals during Bangladesh’s war of independence from what was then East Pakistan in 1971.

Nizami refused to seek clemency from President Abdul Hamid, Huq added.

Amnesty International had called for an immediate halt to Nizami's execution.

According to prosecutors, Nizami was responsible for establishing the pro-Pakistani al-Badr militia back in 1971, which allegedly claimed the lives of top writers, physicians and journalists in a war that, according to the government figures, killed up to three million people.

The Jamaat-e-Islami Party, however, strongly rejected the charges, calling them as false and aimed at removing the leadership of the party. The leaders of the party are accused by the Bangladeshi government of backing Pakistan in the independence war.

Nizami took over the leadership of the party in 2000. He also served as the agriculture minister from 2001 to 2003, and as the industries minister from 2003 to 2006.

In August 2013, the Supreme Court issued a verdict banning the registration of the Jamaat-e-Islami and preventing it from contesting in national elections.

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