As a special consideration, the High Court (HC) is now hearing the much-discussed death reference case of Saudi Arabian diplomat Khalaf al-Ali, who was shot dead in the capital city Dhaka in 2012. Soon after his murder, a special tribunal in December 2012 sentenced five persons to death on charges of killing him. The HC has started the hearing on the death reference case before the vacation period of the court begins. After the court reopens next month, the HC will continue the hearing on the case, sources said.
Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh have close ties, with a large number of Bangladeshis employed in the oil-rich kingdom.
Although the HC is currently hearing the death reference cases of 2008, the HC will hold the hearing on the death reference case of the Saudi diplomat’s killing though it has come to the HC this year, taking into consideration the relations between the two countries, sources in the registrar’s office said.
Khalaf bin Mohammed Salem al-Ali, 45, a second secretary at the embassy of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), was shot at night near the embassy in Dhaka’s diplomatic zone.
This rang alarm bells as it was the first slaying of a diplomat in the country.
In December last year, a special tribunal in Dhaka had sentenced to death five Bangladeshi men for the killing of the Saudi diplomat. Tribunal Judge Mohammad Motahar Hossain handed down the verdict on December 30, 2012, about two months after the trial began in October.
While four convicts — Saiful Islam Mamun, Al Amin, Akbar Ali and Rafiqul Islam — were arrested by the police in July 2012, the fifth accused, Selim Chowdhury, is currently absconding.
The court said the punishment of the fugitive convict would be effective from the day of his arrest or surrender.
The judgment came two months after the court indicted the five suspected murderers as Dhaka had assured Riyadh that the assailants would be tried through a fast-track tribunal.
Saudi Arabia had earlier sent a fact-finding delegation to Bangladesh as no apparent headway could be made in the investigation for months, but the Saudi envoy said his government was happy with the arrest of Ali’s suspected killers and Dhaka’s assurance that the killers would be tried in the shortest possible time.
Saudi Arabia is a key ally of, and a major donor to, Bangladesh, but ties have become strained in recent years after Riyadh tightened recruitment from the South Asian country.
More than two million Bangladeshis — a quarter of the country’s large migrant population — work in the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom.
There was also outrage last October when eight Bangladeshis were beheaded in the Saudi capital after being convicted of robbery and murder.
-With The Independent input
