NEW DELHI: Bangladesh on Sunday opened the high-profile trial of fugitive former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who is accused of orchestrating a “systematic attack” to suppress mass protests against her government in mid-2024 that left up to 1,400 people dead, according to United Nations estimates.At the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) in Dhaka, chief prosecutor Mohammad Tajul Islam told the court that the evidence showed the crackdown was “a coordinated, widespread and systematic attack.”“The accused unleashed all law enforcement agencies and her armed party members to crush the uprising,” Islam said in his opening remarks.Hasina, 77, remains in self-imposed exile in India and has rejected the charges as politically motivated. She fled Bangladesh by helicopter in August 2024 as her 15-year rule collapsed amid a student-led uprising. She has defied an extradition order and did not appear in court.Alongside Hasina, the case involves former police chief Chowdhury Abdullah Al Mamun, who is in custody but was absent from Sunday’s hearing, and ex-interior minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, who is also on the run.The charges include “abetment, incitement, complicity, facilitation, conspiracy, and failure to prevent mass murder during the July uprising.”Islam insisted the case was grounded in justice, not vengeance: “This is not an act of vendetta, but a commitment to the principle that, in a democratic country, there is no room for crimes against humanity.”The prosecution said it has collected extensive evidence, including video and audio recordings, intercepted phone calls, flight data from helicopters and drones, and testimonies from victims and their families.The trial, broadcast live on state-run Bangladesh Television, marks the second hearing connected to the former administration. The ICT court launched its first such trial on May 25, targeting eight police officers over the killing of six protesters on August 5, the day Hasina fled.The ICT was originally established by Hasina herself in 2009 to try war crimes from the 1971 independence war. However, critics have long accused the tribunal of being used to target political rivals. During her tenure, several top opposition figures, especially from the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party, were sentenced to death.Earlier on Sunday, the Bangladesh Supreme Court lifted a ban on Jamaat-e-Islami, enabling it to contest future elections. In contrast, Hasina’s Awami League remains banned by the interim government, which has pledged to hold general elections by June 2026.
