The defence of Jamaat-e-Islami leader ATM Azharul Islam yesterday took the whole day to end cross-examination of the prosecution’s fourth witness who in his deposition said the accused had actively taken part in Jharuar Beel massacre in Rangpur when around 1,200 people had been killed.
Meser Uddin, 66, a freedom fighter from Ramakrishnapur under Badarganj police station testified at the war crimes tribunal 1 on Sunday.
During the whole day cross-examination, the defence questioned the witness about the geographical position of Jharuar Beel. In the morning session, defence counsel Abdus Sobhan Tarafder grilled him about the railway station and the rail tracks of Badarganj and Parbatipur after more than one and a half hours. After the tribunal intervened, he took three more hours to close the cross-examination.
The witness disagreed with the defence suggestion that the massacre of April 15 and 16 in 1971 had been committed by a group of the Pakistani occupation forces. Conducting prosecutor AKM Saiful Islam and his assistant Tapos Kanti Baul were present.
Meanwhile, the tribunal had to defer proceedings in the case against Mobarak Hossain until today since the cross-examination of Meser Ali in Azhar case took the whole day.
The defence was set to produce the second witness yesterday to defend Mobarak, an alleged razakar from Brahmanbaria’s Akhaura. On December 15 last year, the accused appeared in the witness box from the dock to defend his case as the first defence witness.
In the case against fugitive BNP leader Zahid Hossain Khokon alias Khokon Razakar, the prosecution pleaded for time to place the 23rd witness. The tribunal then deferred the trial until March 24.
