A Bangladesh court convicted ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of crimes against humanity on Monday, concluding a months-long trial that found her guilty of ordering a deadly crackdown on a student-led uprising last year.
According to a United Nations report, up to 1,400 people may have been killed during the protests between July 15 and August 5, 2024, with thousands more injured — most from gunfire by security forces — in what was the worst violence in Bangladesh since its 1971 war of independence.
Prosecutors believed she oversaw enforced disappearances and torture of opposition activists through clandestine detention centres run by security agencies.
Hasina has been facing multiple cases since she fled to India after deadly student-led protests in August, 2024.
She was sentenced in absentia to six months in prison by the ICT in a contempt court case in July.
Bangladesh‘s interim administration, led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, pledged to hold leaders, including Hasina, accountable for rights abuses and corruption, including the crackdown on the student-led uprising last July that toppled Hasina’s regime.
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