Bangladesh
Humayun Azad Murder Humayun Azad murder: 4 JMB militants awarded death sentence
Own Correspondent, Dhaka, April 13: A Dhaka court has sentenced four JMB militants to death in the murder case of Dr. Humayun Azad, poet and a professor of Bengali language at the Dhaka University (DU).
In addition to announcing the death sentence on Wednesday (April 13), Judge Al-Mamun of Dhaka's 4th Additional Metropolitan Sessions Judge's Court fined each of them Rs 50,000.
Earlier, on March 27, the judge of the 4th Additional Metropolitan Sessions Judge's Court of Dhaka, after presenting the arguments of the state and the accused, fixed the date for pronouncing the verdict in the case of the 18-year-old incident.
The convicts in the murder case are JMB Shura member Mizanur Rahman alias Minhaj alias Shafiq, Anwar Alam alias Bhagina Shahid, Salehin alias Salahuddin and Nur Mohammad alias Sabu.
Among the four, Mizanur and Anwarul are in jail, while Salehin and Nur Mohammad are absconding.
According to the case and court documents, poet Humayun Azad was attacked by militants in front of the Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission on February 27, 2004 on his way home from Amar Ekushey Book Fair. The militants hacked him with a knife and an axe, and left him in a bloody state with serious injuries.
The next day (February 28, 2004), his brother Manjur Kabir filed a case of attempted murder at Ramna Police Station in the capital.
After undergoing treatments at the Combined Military Hospital (CMH) in the capital for 22 days and in a Thailand hospital for 48 days, Humayun Azad died on August 12 of the same year in Germany's Munich. After his death, the case of attempted murder was converted into a murder case.
After investigation, five accused were charged with murder and the Explosives Act. Of the 58 witnesses in the murder case, 41, including the investigating officers, testified.
Of the five accused, two are in jail, two are absconding and one - Hafiz Mahmood- died.
