War Crimes Trial
10th prosecution witness against SQ Chowdhury cross-examined
reedom fighter Kazi Mohammad Nurul Absar on Tuesday testified that a cook of a restaurant at Chandpura in Chittagong was arrested in September 1971 after an abortive attack by freedom fighters on the life of Salauddin Quader Chowdhury.
The cook was brutally tortured in custody for which he died after independence, the 10th prosecution witness against Salauddin said during cross examination by Ahsanul Huq Hena, the defence lawyer of the war crimes accused.
Salauddin was in the dock of the International Crimes Tribunal-1.
Absar, now 61, told the tribunal that the cook was arrested following the attack on Salauddin’s car in September, 1971 and was subjected to brutal torture in custody.
Nurul Absar said that he himself was in the freedom fighters team which had attacked Salauddin.
He said that he did not know whether or not Salauddin, his father Fazlul Quader Chowdhury or a relative of the driver had lodged a case against them following the attack.
On August 28, Absar testified that Salauddin was involved in the killing of Nutan Chandra Sinha, founder of Kundeshwari Oushadhalaya, Kundeshwari School and Kundeshwari College and in the massacres in various places of Chittagong including Unosottorpara, Rangunia and Roazan during the 1971 War of Independence.
Earlier, Absar said that a team of freedom fighters had attacked the car of Salauddin in September, 1971 near the house of Dr Sami Uddin in Chittagong to kill Salauddin.
He said that the driver of the car was killed in the attack but Salauddin managed to escape.
Absar said that his friend Aziz Uddin, son of Sami Uddin, told him that a car and a jeep would come to their house.
He said that he did not know how many people gathered at the place following the attack as he never asked Aziz about it and he himself did not visit the spot after the operation.
He said that he was in a group eight freedom fighters in Chittagong.
He refuted a defence suggestion that the incident of attack never occurred in front of Sami Uddin’s house and that vested quarters only said it for propaganda.
He said that he and Salauddin followed separate ideals.
He also rejected a defence suggestion that he testified against Salauddin only to obstruct him from attending parliament and to shut his voice.
He also refuted a defence suggestion that everything he had stated about the killing of Nutan Chandra Sinha, and the mass killings in Unosottorpara, Rangunia and Roazan in 1971 was motivated and tutored by the investigation officer.
At the end of his cross-examination, Salauddin’s another defence counsel Fakhrul Islam stood up and submitted that the tribunal should hear the petition of the accused for arranging his attendance in parliament session which began on Tuesday.
The tribunal chairman said that the matter would be heard in due time.
When Fakhrul, without following the direction, continued with his submission, the tribunal said, ‘For the time being the prayer is rejected.’
The tribunal adjourned proceedings of the case until Wednesday morning.
/Salauddin was a student in 1971.
In 1980s, he was a leader of Jatiya Party and a minister in the government of ousted military dictator H M Ersahad.
Later, he quit Jatiya Party and floated National Democratic Party.
In 1991, he was elected to parliament representing his own party, NDP.
From 1991 to 1996, Salauddin was in the Awami League led movement against the then BNP government on the demand for introduction of non-party caretaker government for holding parliamentary elections.
Subsequently, Saluddin joined BNP and was elected to parliament a number of times on its ticket.
Courtesy of New Age
