The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has temporarily halted the execution of three Bangladeshis on murder charges, to allow representatives of the convicts to negotiate with the victim’s family for clemency.
In a statement released yesterday, the foreign ministry said the death penalties for three Bangladeshi nationals, Mohammed Nayeb Ali, Kamrul Islam and Atique Ashraf Hossain, were scheduled to be carried out on January 22in Sharjah.
However, UAE authorities halted the execution to allow representatives of the convicts to negotiate with the victim’s family “to complete the legal formalities regarding the pardon.”
The Bangladeshi ambassador to UAE Muhammad Imran, said the convicted migrant Bangladeshi workers were set to be executed for murdering an unidentified foreign national, who was also a worker, in 2009 over a personal conflict.
“The highest UAE authorities issued a royal decree last year confirming their death penalties after the exhaustion of trial processes in the lower and higher courts of the UAE,” he added.
He also noted that the execution was halted for an indefinite period, after an intensive effort by the Bangladeshi embassy while, “we [the Bangladeshi embassy] sought time to find out the victim’s blood heirs, and negotiate with them for the convicts’ clemency,” in line with the Shariah law.
President Abdul Hamid earlier sought the intervention of his UAE counterpart to pardon the convicts.