Bangladesh hangs top Jamaat leader Mir Quasem Ali for 1971 war crimes

DHAKA: Bangladesh’s fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami leader and media tycoon Mir Quasem Ali was hanged on Saturday night, the sixth Islamist to be executed for war crimes committed during the country’s 1971 Liberation War against Pakistan.

Ali was hanged in Kashimpur Central Jail on the outskirts of the capital.

“He was hanged at 10.35pm(local time),” Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan said.

His execution came after 63-year-old Ali refused to seek presidential clemency on Friday.

The presidential mercy was the last resort for Ali, who was the infamous pro-Pakistan Al-Badr militia’s third most important figure, to save his neck after the Supreme Court rejected his final review petition on Tuesday.

Earlier, authorities had called Ali’s family to the prison to meet him.

“Twenty-two members of his family reached the jail to see him (Ali) for the last time,” private TV channels reported.

Ali, who owned several business houses and media outlets including a now suspended TV channel, was a central executive council member of Jamaat-e-Islami.

He pumped billions into the Jamaat since the mid-1980s to put it on a firm financial footing in Bangladesh.

 

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