Bangladesh has again asked India to extradite former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who was recently sentenced to death in absentia over last year’s deadly crackdown against a student-led uprising.
Touhid Hossain, who holds the foreign affairs portfolio in Bangladesh’s interim administration, on Sunday said Dhaka had sent a letter two days ago, urging New Delhi to hand over the fugitive ex-leader.
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Hasina, 78, has been in hiding in India – her close ally when she was the prime minister of Bangladesh for 15 years, until her autocratic rule was overthrown in a mass uprising in August 2024, in which more than 1,400 people were killed, according to the United Nations.
On Monday, a special International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) in Dhaka convicted Hasina of crimes against humanity and sentenced her to death, fulfilling a key pledge by the interim government, led by Nobel Peace laureate Muhammad Yunus.
Following the court ruling, Bangladesh’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that India had an “obligatory responsibility” under a bilateral extradition treaty signed in 2013 to facilitate the former leader’s return.
The ministry said keeping Hasina is a “grave act of unfriendly behaviour”, and called it “a travesty of justice for any other country to grant asylum to these individuals convicted of crimes against humanity”.
India’s Foreign Ministry responded by saying it had “noted” the Hasina verdict. But India has so far not commented on the prospects of her extradition. Bangladeshi newspaper Prothom Alo says Dhaka has made at least three such extradition requests so far.
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India’s past support for Hasina has frayed relations between the two South Asian neighbours since her overthrow.
But tensions appear to have eased slightly this week after Bangladesh’s National Security Adviser Khalilur Rahman visited India for a regional security summit, where he also met his Indian counterpart, Ajit Doval.
Media reports in Bangladesh said Rahman has invited Doval for a visit.
Bangladesh will hold its first general elections since the protests in February. Hasina’s party, the Awami League, is barred from any political activity.
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