Protests in Pakistan over Mollah's execution

Pakistani activists of the Jamaat-i-Islami held protests in various Sindh towns giving vent to their anger over the execution of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami leader and war criminal Abdul Quader Mollah.

The activists also offered funeral prayers Friday for the departed soul, Dawn reported.

Activists of Jamaat-i-Islami and Jamaat-ud-Daawa protested in Hyderabad against the execution. They criticised the Pakistan government for not playing its role in defending its patriotic sons who had struggled for the integrity of the country.

Jamaat-ud-Daawa leaders also condemned the execution of Mollah. They said that instead of raising its voice against the injustice, the Pakistan government was busy in potato and onion trade with India.

Jamaat-i-Islami leaders Abdul Waheed Qureshi, Shaikh Shaukat Ali and others urged the government to sever diplomatic ties with Bangladesh and expel its ambassador.

They also said that Bangladesh had backtracked on the historic pact between the late Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Bangladesh leader Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, which stated that both the countries would not take vengeful action against any person for his role before and during the 1971 war.

But Rehman's daughter and Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina had trampled upon that pact and unleashed a reign of terror against the Jamaat-e-Islami leaders, they said.

They added that Mollah was hanged because he took part in the struggle for the defence of Pakistan, but regretfully the Pakistan government preferred to look the other way.

Mollah was hanged late Thursday in the first execution of a 1971 Liberation War criminal in Bangladesh after the country's highest court dismissed his petition to review his death sentence.