International Crimes Tribunal on Sunday jailed and fined three Jamaat-e-Islami leaders on charges of contempt.
The tribunal indicted them on Apr 21 for commenting on a sub-judice matter.
Jamaat’s Acting Secretary General Rafiqul Islam Khan and Member of Parliament (MP) Hamidur Rahman Azad were sentenced to three months in prison and fined Tk 3,000 each with an additional two weeks in jail if they did not pay the fine.
The organisation’s Dhaka Metropolitan Assistant Secretary Mohammad Selim Uddin was given a day's sentence and fined TK 1,000 and week of additional imprisonment for non-payment of fine.
ICT-2 issued arrest warrants on Mar 6 after they did not appear in court for hearing on three occassions.
Rapid Action Battelion (RAB) arrested Selim Uddin and produced him before court on Mar 10.
He got bail and submitted a written explanation on that day which the court ruled ‘unsatisfactory’.
The two others are absconding.
On Feb 4, at a party rally Jamaat leader Selim Uddin had said, “This is not the last verdict… There will be reactions after the verdict… It cannot be taken lightly… To save the country from civil war, there is no scope for verdicts from a controversial tribunal.”
The Jamaat leaders had questioned the efficacy of the war crimes tribunal, perhaps anticipating the several life and death sentence to their senior leaders
In that rally, Hamidur Rahman had said, “This tribunal cannot go on for even a minute more.”
ICT on Feb 7 issued notice against their statements after the speeches had been reported in the media on Feb 5.
The notice sought explanations as to why actions would not be taken against them for contempt of court.
Meanwhile, Rafiqul Islam Khan had commented on the tribunal’s verdict in a press briefing of Feb 5.
ICT had asked him to appear before court and explain his comments, which he did not do.
Earlier, Home Minister MK Alamgir was also asked to explain his comments on the issue.
The tribunal had also issued show-cause notices against Minister without portfolio Suranjit Sengupta and BNP leader MK Anwar for commenting on verdicts of the tribunal or on its functioning.
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