Bangladesh set up a special tribunal on Thursday to try people accused of committing war crimes during the country's bloody 1971 secession struggle against Pakistan. Investigation and prosecution teams were also named to prosecute people who sided with Pakistan and committed murder, rape and arson during the war, law minister Shafiq Ahmed told AFP.
"The tribunal will hold trials of those suspected of committing crimes against humanity and genocide," he said. Bangladesh was part of Pakistan until the secession campaign led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The government claims the war left three million people dead. Rahman, the father of the current prime minister Sheikh Hasina, had planned to put the alleged war criminals on trial before his assassination in a coup in 1975 - which Hasina says was masterminded by war criminals.
At least 11,000 war crime suspects were set free by the post-coup government, and Bangladesh has since struggled to come to terms with its bloody birth and the break-up of the subcontinent's Muslim homeland. A private group that has 'investigated' the conflict has identified 1,775 people, including Pakistani generals and local Islamists allied with Pakistan, as complicit in the atrocities.
Law minister Ahmed said Pakistani generals and army officers won't be tried by the tribunal. "Only the Bangladeshis who formed auxiliary forces to aid the Pakistani army and committed crimes against humanity will be put on trial," he said.
A date for the court's first hearing has not yet been scheduled. Ahead of formation of the tribunal, Bangladesh became the first south Asian country to ratify the founding Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, the ICC said on Wednesday. The ICC is the world's only independent, permanent court with the jurisdiction to try genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
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