Four Mujib killers to seek president’s pardon

DHAKA - Four of the five former army officers who were sentenced to death for killing Bangladesh’s founding father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman will seek the presidential pardon, jail officials announced Sunday.

Lt. Col. Syed Farooq Rahman, Maj. Bazlul Huda, Maj. A.K.M. Mohiuddin Ahmed and Lt. Col. Mohiuddin Ahmed expressed their willingness to file the petitions while Lt. Col. Sultan Shahriar Rashid Khan is yet to take any decision in this regard, Star Online reported.

Their lawyers have told the government that they would seek a review of Thursday’s Supreme Court judgment within the stipulated 30 day period.

Sheikh Mujib, officially referred to with the honorific Bangabandhu who was then the country’s president, was killed in a coup on the morning of Aug 15, 1975, less than four years after he led a movement that culminated in the emergence of Bangladesh after its violent separation from Pakistan.

Seeking presidential clemency is now the only way open to the convicts awaiting the gallows in high security Dhaka jail.

The relatives of Bazlul Huda, including his wife and mother, went to the jail to visit him Sunday.

The Supreme Court upheld the death sentence to a dozen former army personnel, including the four. The sentence had earlier been confirmed by the high court.

The six absconding convicts are: Lt. Col. Khandaker Abdur Rashid, Lt. Col. Shariful Haque Dalim, Lt. Col. S.H.M.B. Nur Chowdhury, Lt. Col. A.M. Rashed Chowdhury, Capt. Abdul Mazed and Risaldar Mosleuddin Khan.

A seventh official, Lt. Col. Abdul Aziz Pasha, died in Zimbabwe in June 2001 where he had taken political asylum.