Bangladesh’s former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has been sentenced to death after she was found guilty of crimes against humanity.
A special tribunal found she was responsible for ordering a violent crackdown on student-led protests last year, during which the UN estimates up to 1,400 people died, most by gunfire from security forces
Hasina has called the court’s decision “biased and politically motivated” in a statement released after the verdict.
She was tried in her absence and has been living in exile in India since being forced from power
The verdict will put India under pressure to extradite Hasina, Bangladesh’s longest-serving prime minister, but it is unlikely to do so
Security has been ramped up across Bangladesh over fears of a backlash, with some protests already breaking out this morning.
The Bangladesh government has for months been calling for Hasina, who currently resides in India, to be extradited.
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A previous extradition plea was for a lesser sentence for contempt of court, which India did not respond to.
Bangladesh currently has an interim government run by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus, which was formed after the student-led protest that overthrew Sheikh Hasina’s then-ruling Awami League party.
In the streets of Dhaka, tear gas has been deployed after news that the country’s former Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, was sentenced to death in absentia over a brutal crackdown on protests in 2024.
Hasina was tried in absentia by a special tribunal. She has been in exile in India.
Her state-appointed lawyer, Mohammad Hossain, says he is “sad and wishes the verdict had been different.
“I cannot even appeal because my clients are absent; that’s why I am sad.”
