Dhaka, Jan 27 (IANS) The Supreme Court Wednesday dismissed the review petitions filed by five former army officers who are lodged in prison over the killing of country’s founding father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The petitions were against the court’s verdict confirming their death sentence.
The four-member bench of the Appellate Division headed by Chief Justice Md Tafazzul Islam passed the order, clearing the way for executing them, The Daily Star reported.

Chief State Counsel Anisul Huq said that the jail authorities could execute the five detained convicts at any time by Jan 31.

As per the jail code provision, the jail authorities could execute a convict between 21 and 28 days after a trial court issued death warrant against him, he added.

The trial court issued the death warrant against the five men Jan 3 and the jail authorities will count it from that day, he said.

The five former army officers - Syed Farooq Rahman, Sultan Shahriar Rashid Khan, Mohiuddin Ahmed, Bazlul Huda and A.K.M. Mohiuddin Ahmed - filed the review petitions with the apex court on different days of this month.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and most of his family members were killed in a putsch led by serving and former army officers Aug 15, 1975.

On Nov 19 last year, the apex court confirmed death sentences to a dozen ex-army personnel, including the five who have been detained.

Of the seven others, one died and six are on the run. The government has moved the Interpol and the governments in the US, Canada, Libya and Pakistan to get their custody.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is Mujibur Rahman’s daughter, has ignored a plea by Amnesty International, a US-based human rights watchdog that the death sentences be converted into life imprisonment.