The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court today granted Jamaat-e-Islami leader ATM Azharul Islam the right to appeal against his death sentence for crimes against humanity committed during the 1971 Liberation War.
A five-member bench of the Appellate Division, led by Chief Justice Syed Refaat Ahmed, passed the order on Tuesday (26 February) after hearing a petition seeking a review of the court’s earlier verdict, which had upheld the International Crimes Tribunal’s (ICT) ruling sentencing Azharul to death.
The apex court has scheduled 22 April for the appeal hearing.
Barrister Ehsan A Siddiq, along with lawyers SM Shahjahan and Mohammad Shishir Manir, represented Azharul during the proceedings.
On 19 July 2020, Azharul, through his legal team, including the late Advocate Khandker Mahbub Hossain and Advocate Mohammad Shishir Manir, submitted a 23-page review petition, citing 14 grounds for reconsideration of the apex court's judgment.
Shishir Manir had earlier stated that witness testimonies did not fully corroborate the charges against Azharul.
The Appellate Division had upheld Azharul’s death sentence on 31 October 2019. The verdict, delivered by a four-member bench led by then-Chief Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain, was reached by majority opinion, nearly five years after the ICT-1 convicted him for atrocities committed in Rangpur during the war.
Supreme Court upheld four charges against Azharul while acquitting him of one.
The full text of the verdict was released on 15 March 2020, allowing him to file a review petition.
Azharul was allegedly the commander of the Al-Badr force and president of Chhatra Sangha, the then-student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami in Rangpur, during the war.
Several Jamaat leaders, including Motiur Rahman Nizami, Abdul Quader Mollah, Muhammad Kamaruzzaman, Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed, Mir Quasem Ali, as well as BNP leader Salauddin Quader Chowdhury, were previously executed following Supreme Court verdicts for crimes against humanity in 1971.