Dhaka--Bangladesh tightened security nationwide Sunday after a senior Islamist was hanged for war crimes during the 1971 independence conflict, a move that triggered anger among his opposition supporters but celebrations elsewhere.
Police said extra officers were deployed in the capital and other major cities hours after Mohammad Kamaruzzaman, the third most senior leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, was executed in a Dhaka prison late on Saturday.
The 62-year-old was only the second person to be hanged for war crimes following his conviction in 2013 by a controversial tribunal, set up to investigate atrocities during the conflict.
"We're alert against any bid to create anarchy or violence," a police spokesman told AFP. No major incidents had been reported as of early evening.
Kamaruzzaman lost his final appeal last week against a death sentence for carrying out a massacre at a village as head of a pro-Pakistan militia.
Jamaat, the largest Islamist party, called a nationwide "prayer day" for Sunday and a strike on Monday in protest at Kamaruzzaman's "heinous killing". The party branded it an act of "revenge and pre-planned murder" by the secular government.
The hanging is expected to deepen a months-long political crisis that has seen the Islamists and the main opposition party launch nationwide protests to try to topple Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
But the execution is unlikely to trigger the widespread deadly violence which followed the first war crimes execution in 2013 -- also involving an Islamist.
Hundreds of Jamaat activists were killed that year when the party held a series of nationwide protests against trials of its leaders by the tribunal, which was established by Hasina's government.
Security forces have since rounded up thousands of Jamaat supporters in a massive crackdown on the unrest.
AFP
