Bangladesh Sentences Hasina to Death in Absentia

A Bangladesh tribunal has sentenced ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and former Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal to death in absentia for crimes against humanity stemming from the government's crackdown on student-led protests in 2024. The ruling, delivered on Monday by the International Crimes Tribunal in Dhaka, comes as Hasina remains in exile in India, where she fled in August 2024 amid the unrest that led to her government's collapse.

The tribunal found Hasina, 78, guilty on three counts: incitement to violence, issuing orders to kill, and failing to prevent atrocities during the July-August protests over job quotas, which escalated into widespread clashes that killed up to 1,400 people. Judge Golam Mortuza Mozumder announced the verdict, stating the court had decided on a single sentence of death. Kamal was convicted on four similar counts and received the same penalty. In a separate development, former police chief Chowdhury Abdullah Al-Mamun, who pleaded guilty and testified as a state witness, was sentenced to five years in prison.

Hasina, who did not attend the trial despite court orders, issued a statement from India denouncing the proceedings as "biased and...