An application has been filed with the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) seeking a neutral judicial inquiry and medical treatment for former Lieutenant Colonel (retd) Tareq Sayeed Mohammad, following allegations that prison guards beat him with batons inside Munshiganj District Jail late at night after turning off the lights.
On Wednesday (September 30), a two-member tribunal panel led by Justice Nazrul Islam Chowdhury, Chairman of ICT-2, alongside Judge Noor Mohammad Shahriar Kabir, set next Thursday (October 1) for hearing the petition.
Tareq Sayeed’s lawyer, Mahmudul Husain Rubel, told journalists that the tribunal ordered Tareq Sayeed to be sent to jail on August 10 in connection with two cases involving crimes against humanity, and later granted permission for a one-day interrogation on September 16.
According to the lawyer’s claims, prison guards disconnected the electricity inside Munshiganj Jail late that night and launched an attack on Tareq Sayeed with batons, leaving him with severe injuries to his head and various parts of his body.
On the other hand, the Munshiganj jail authorities denied the allegations of torture, stating that Tareq Sayeed was subjected to disciplinary measures under prison rules—including the suspension of telephone privileges and family visits—for misbehaving with the Jail Super and throwing spoiled food. He was subsequently transferred to Kishoreganj Jail.
Earlier in the morning, Tareq Sayeed was produced before the International Crimes Tribunal in connection with two separate cases involving crimes against humanity related to the enforced disappearance and murder of BNP leaders in Cumilla and Lakshmipur in 2013. The court extended the deadline for submitting the investigation report by two months to November 30.
