Decision on presidential clemency
Mir Quasem waits for return of missing son
“A maximum of 7 days will be given to Mir Quasem for filing the plea: IGP (prisons)
STAFF REPORTER
Death row convict Mir Quasem Ali yesterday refused to take any decision on presidential clemency unless his son barrister Ahmed Bin Quasem was returned.
Some unidentified persons allegedly abducted Ahmed Bin Quasem from his Mirpur DOHS residence on August 9.
Mir Quasem told his family members he will take his decision whether to submit a mercy petition to the President only after the return of his son.
Mir Quasem cannot take the big decision without consulting his son, who legally represents him, said Khandokar Ayesha Khatun, wife of the convicted war criminal. She told this to reporters after meeting her husband inside Kashimpur jail in Gazipur.
According to Nasir Ahmed, jailer of Kashimpur Central Jail-2, 10 members of Mir Kashems family his wife and two daughters, his two daughter-in-laws, his son-in-law and four grandchildrenentered the jail around 2:30pm and stayed there for an hour.
The jail authority told The Independent that they did not call the family members to visit the death row convict.
Mir Quasems family members alleged that Ahmed Bin Quasem was picked up by some unidentified men from his Mirpur residence around 10:50pm.
Inspector Dadon Fakir, officer-in-charge of Pallabi police station, said they came to know about the incident from the media, but no one lodged any written complaint regarding the issue. He however, said that they were working on it.
In an another development, Brig. Gen. Syed Iftekhar Uddin, inspector general of prisons, yesterday told reporters that a maximum of seven days will be given to Mir Quasem for filing his mercy petition to the President. Mir Quasem will be given a reasonable timeframe for filing a mercy petition, but itll not be more than seven days, he said, replying to a question while addressing a press briefing at the Prisons Headquarters in the city yesterday afternoon. When his attention was brought to the existing jail code that allows a death row convict seven days to file the mercy petition, Iftekhar Uddin said the Mir Quasem was not convicted in any ordinary case and that seven days are only allowed for death row convicts under the ordinary law.
But Mir Quasem is not eligible to get seven days time as per the jail code, he explained.
When asked where the war criminal would be executed, Iftekhar Uddin said it was yet to be decided. Well take the decision after consulting this matter with other officials, he added. Iftekhar Uddin requested the media not to broadcast live the execution of the war criminal as it may harm the mental health of children.
He said jail officials read out the full verdict to Mir Quasem around 7:30am inside Kashimpur jail. The officials also asked him whether he wanted to seek presidential clemency by admitting his crimes. He has asked for some time to inform us about his decision, the inspector general of prisons added.
Top-ranking war criminal Mir Quasem Ali, also known as key financier of the Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh, on Tuesday lost his final legal battle to avoid execution as the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court dismissed his review petition filed against the death sentence awarded to him for committing crimes against humanity during the War of Liberation in 1971.
He has been kept behid bars at Kashimpur jail in Gazipur since his arrest on June 17, 2012.
