BNP pledges fair trial if voted to power
BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Tuesday has said if their party forms government, they will ensure a neutral and fair investigation into the BDR carnage of 2009.
Claiming that proper trial was not held, he said
that the probe panel formed at that time never published a full report.
“We think that the trial was unfair. We’ll definitely take an initiative if we form the government to hold an impartial investigation and a fair trial,” said Fakhrul.
The BNP Secretary General together with party senior leaders placed a wreath at the graves of army officials killed during the Peelkhana carnage.
They also offered fateha for the salvation of the departed souls of the slain army officials.
He described the February 25 of 2009 as a very heart rending day in the country’s history and said that such an incident is a threat to democracy and the country’s sovereignty.
Seventy-four people, including 57 army officers, were murdered by the misguided sainiks on February 25-26 in 2009 inside the erstwhile Bangladesh Rifles headquarters in the capital’s Peelkhana.
An internal trial was conducted through which about 6,000 soldiers were jailed. Later, a general court began trial proceedings of the massacre.
A Dhaka Judge Court subsequently handed down death sentences to 152 of the accused and life imprisonment to 160 others. Another 256 accused were fined and given jail terms in 2013.
The High Court upheld the death sentence of 139 accused in 2017. It also jailed 185 for life while another 228 were given different jail terms.
