By Daily Caller Staff
Bangladesh’s ousted prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, was sentenced to death in absentia Monday by the country’s International Crimes Tribunal after a months-long trial that found she ordered a lethal crackdown on student-led protests in 2024.
The verdict follows a United Nations human rights inquiry that estimated up to 1,400 people were killed and thousands injured during the July–August 2024 uprising, the worst political violence since Bangladesh’s 1971 war. The caretaker administration led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus urged calm and said it would deal strictly with unrest as Dhaka demanded India extradite Hasina, who fled there in August 2024, according to Reuters. (RELATED: Protesters Force Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina To Flee Country After Two Decades Rule)
“We have decided to inflict her with only one sentence, that is sentence of death,” Judge Golam Mortuza Mozumder said from the Dhaka tribunal, the outlet reported.
Leader of Bangladesh’s Awami League Party Sheikh Hasina Wajed prays at the Dargah of Khwaja Muinuddin Chishti in Ajmer, some 500kms south-west of New Delhi, 29 September 2005. (Photo by -/AFP via Getty Images)
Families of victims in the packed courtroom clapped as the judgment was read. Prosecutors told the court they had evidence of a direct order from Hasina to use live fire to suppress demonstrations, the outlet reported. India said it noted the verdict and would “engage constructively” without committing to extradition.
Hasina, 78, dismissed the tribunal as “biased and politically motivated,” calling it a “rigged tribunal” in a statement sent to media after the ruling. Her Awami League has been banned from contesting elections expected in February.
Security forces were deployed around government buildings and the tribunal complex as tensions spiked ahead of the decision, with at least 30 crude bombs reportedly detonated and vehicles torched in recent days. Yunus said the path forward requires rebuilding trust between citizens and institutions, while the interim government warned that any attempt to create disorder would be dealt with strictly.
The U.N. report, released in February, alleged widespread shootings of unarmed protesters and mass detentions, and urged prosecutions that meet international standards.
