The International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) on Sunday framed charges against 26 people, including former Dhaka-18 lawmaker Mohammad Habib Hasan and former Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) Commissioner Habibur Rahman, in a case filed over the killing of BUP student Mir Mahfuzur Rahman Mugdha and 10 other people during the anti-discrimination student movement in Uttara in 2024.
The three-member ICT-2, chaired by Justice Nozrul Islam Chowdhury, passed the order, paving the way for the formal trial.
The tribunal had initially scheduled September 16 to deliver its order on charge framing but deferred it to September 23. The order was postponed again to October 11.
The accused include police personnel and local leaders and activists of the Awami League and its affiliated organisations. Of them, eight are in jail, while the remaining 18 are absconding.
Those in custody include former DMP Additional Deputy Commissioner (Uttara Division) Mirza Salahuddin, former Officer-in-Charge of Uttara East Police Station Mujibur Rahman, former constable of Azampur Police Outpost Hossain Ali, Uttara East unit Awami League President Monowar Islam Chowdhury Robin and unit Jubo League President Delwar Hossain Rubel.
The fugitive accused include former Dhaka-18 MP Habib Hasan, ex-DMP chief Habibur and former DC (Uttara Division) Kazi Ashraful Azim.
According to the case statement, Mugdha, an MBA student at Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP), was helping transport injured people to hospitals and distributing water and biscuits among participants in the anti-discrimination student movement in Sector 3 of Uttara on July 18, 2024, when he was shot.
Other protesters took him to Uttara Crescent Hospital, where doctors declared him dead.
The prosecution alleges that indiscriminate firing on protesters in Uttara on July 18 and 19, 2024, resulted in the deaths of Mugdha and 10 others. The accused faced two charges of crimes against humanity.
The first charge was brought for indiscriminate shooting at protesters along the Dhaka-Mymensingh highway and surrounding areas in Uttara on July 18, which killed seven people, including Mugdha.
The prosecution also said that Uber driver Mokhlesur Rahman, also known as Durjoy, was run over by an armoured personnel carrier (APC) operated by police.
His body was subsequently thrown into the Turag River to conceal the crime, according to the charge.
The same charge includes allegations that five people, including Mehedi Hasan, were shot and seriously injured with the intention of killing them.
The second charge relates to indiscriminate firing on protesters in the same area on July 19, which killed four people, including Ridwan Sharif Riyad Joyce.
Raisul Rahman Ratul was also shot and seriously injured in an attempt to kill him.
The prosecution contends that the killings and attempted killings on the two days were not isolated incidents but part of a planned, widespread and systematic attack constituting crimes against humanity.