Nizami, Babar in condemned cell

Twelve out of 14 death convicts in 2004 Chittagong arms haul case have been shifted to Chittagong Central Jail’s condemned cell. Jamaat-e-Islami’s Ameer and former Industries Minister Matiur Rahman Nizami and former State Minister for Home Lutfuzzaman Babar are among them. Chittagong’s Senior Jail Superintendent Sagir Mia said they were transferred to the death row after the court handed down them capital punishment on Thursday in two cases filed a decade ago over the arms haul. Two of the condemned convicts are absconding. Special privileges of eight of the convicts have been cancelled, the prison official said. “If anyone is sentenced to death, he is stripped of ‘division facilities’,” Mia explained. They will now be entitled to normal facilities like other inmates. Other convicts shifted to the condemned cell are former NSI field officer Akbar Hossain Khan, former NSI Director (Security) Wing Commander (retd) Shahabuddin, former NSI Director General (DG) Brigadier General (retd) Md Abdur Rahim, former NSI DG Major General (retd) Rezzakul Haider Chowdhury, former NSI Deputy Director (Technical) Major (retd) Liakat Hossain, former Managing Director of CUFL Mohsin Uddin Talukder and General Manager (administration) KM Enamul Haq, smugglers Hafizur Rahman, Deen Mohammad and their accomplice Haji Md Abdus Sobhan. Indian separatist organisation ULFA's military wing commander Paresh Barua, and former Industries Secretary Nurul Amin, too, were sentenced to death. They were tried in absentia and are now absconding. A total of 52 people were named as accused in the charge-sheet and supplementary charge-sheet in the two cases filed with Karnaphuli Police Station of Chittagong city after a huge cache of arms and ammunition was seized from the state-owned Chittagong Urea Fertiliser Ltd (CUFL) jetty in the port city while being offloaded from two fishing trawlers in the early hours of April 2, 2004, according to bdnews24.com.