The defence for the detained BNP lawmaker Salauddin Quader Chowdhury on Thursday began the closing arguments saying that Salauddin client was facing the war crimes trial because of he was son of the late Muslim League leader Fazlul Quader Chowdhury.
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party standing committee member, facing the war crimes trial on 23 counts of crimes against humanity committed in Chittagong, was in the dock.
At the outset of the proceedings, junior defence counsel Md Huzzatul Islam Khan Alfesani submitted an application seeking an adjournment until Sunday on the ground that senior defence counsel Ahsanul Huq Hena was sick.
The tribunal, however, asked Ahasnul, who was in the courtroom, to begin the closing arguments, saying that it would consider the application later if he became unable to make the arguments.
Ahsanul spent the day making statements mostly on his own professional success, Salauddin’s political career and the country’s judiciary.
As Ahsanul kept making statements on his and his family members’ educational and professional success, the tribunal asked him to begin his arguments defending his client.
‘A seminar can be held on your professional life,’ the tribunals said.
In his arguments, Ahsanul said the investigation officer in the case, Nurul Islam, was a police officer and he was biased against Salauddin.
He said that Salauddin was not in the country during the commission of the offences and had no involvement in the crimes for which he was now facing the trial.
The defence lawyer said that the tribunal was a domestic court not an international court and thus the references of international courts on war crimes should not be applicable here.
He argued that Salauddin was in the dock only for his family tradition and he had no political identity in 1971.
‘He [Salauddin] was neither an accomplice of the Pakistani occupation army nor a member of Al-Badr,’ Ahsanul said.
He said that Salauddin was an Islamic scholar, western educated, liberal democrat and law expert and he had friends as well as enemies.
His arguments remained incomplete when the tribunal adjourned the hearing until Sunday.
-With New Age input
