A prosecution witness Sunday claimed that he knew Matiur Rahman Nizami as a war criminal and that he saw the Jamaat-e-Islami chief involved in anti-liberation work during 1971.
Aynul Haque, the ninth witness for the prosecution, also claimed in his deposition at the ICT 1 that Nizami visited his school along with accomplices aiming to form a unit of the Peace Committee, an auxiliary force to the Pakistan Army during the war.
“On May 10, 1971, when I went to my school, I saw some people sitting before the head teacher. My head teacher introduced me to someone named Matiur Rahman Nizami and said they came here from Sathia upazilla to form a Peace Committee. I saw then that ‘Dalal Asad’ and Nizami was working together to form a peace committee.”
He said he learnt that Nizami was the president of Islami Chhatra Sangha, the then student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami, by reading newspapers in early 1971.
The 72-year old retired schoolteacher continued that on May 14, 1971, razakars with help from the Pakistan Army killed at least 350 people of Demra, Rupshi and Bausgari villages. “I lost many relatives in the killing including uncles and cousins. I buried them with the help of others without any last rituals.”
After his deposition, the tribunal adjourned the hearing till tomorrow. Nizami was indicted on May 28 last year on 16 counts of crimes against humanity including murder, rape, arson and inciting violence.
