Full ICT Tribunal judgment raises more questions about Hasina-Maksud conversation

After Sheikh Hasina was convicted on three counts of Crimes against Humanity relating to the July–August 2024 protests, I wrote an article examining the intercepted conversation between Hasina and the then vice-chancellor of Dhaka University that took place on the evening of 14 July 2024. From the excerpts of the judgment read out in court on 17 November 2025, it was apparent that the Tribunal considered this conversation to be evidence that Hasina had already “ordered killing” on that day.

This recording is particularly significant for the first charge against Hasina, for which she was sentenced to life imprisonment, concerning events between 14 and 16 July, including the killing of Abu Sayed. It is the only piece of direct evidence presented by the prosecution where it claims that Hasina had issued any instruction “to kill” protestors during that period.
In the earlier article, I had argued that the 14 July conversation did not support the Tribunal’s conclusion. I ended, however, by noting: “It will be interesting to see if the full judgment, when published, provides more detailed judicial reasoning on the Tribunal’s interpretation of the 14 July conversation.”

The final judgment is now available, allowing for a closer examination of this issue. Hasina’s overall conviction for crimes against humanity does not rest on this recording; even if the first charge were to fail, the two remaining charges—on which she was also convicted—do not entirely depend on it.

Nonetheless, the Tribunal’s treatment of the recording is significant, as it offers insight into the extent to which the judges are able (and willing) to assess the evidence before them independently, and whether they are prepared to reach conclusions favorable to Hasina (or other Awami League defendants) when the evidence supports such findings.

In other words, it helps determine whether the Tribunal functions as a genuinely independent judicial body or whether it functions more as a “rubber stamp” for political expectations and prevailing public sentiment, much like the earlier Tribunals under the Awami League government were frequently accused of doing in a very different political environment.

The Maksud Hasina conversation is referred to in all three charges.
After quoting a segment of the conversation, Charge 1 states that (at p.35) after “Thus Sheikh Hasina clearly disclosed  in  the  conversation  that  she ordered  to  kill.”

The charge then sets out four sperate counts of crimes against humanity, two of which depend on this particular interpretation of the conversation: one count concerns “giving order to kill the protestors” and another count concerns “killing Abu Sayed pursuant to her order”

Charge 2 also refers to the same segment of the intercepted conversation but, notably, uses different language to describe it. The charge states “it is quite clear  that Sheikh Hasina already ordered to hang the protesters like the Razakars  (Criminals of  war  of  independence  in 1971) who  have  been hanged before and also to kill them as those killed in England  for such protest.”

And Charge 3, states that in the conversation Sheikh Hasina “mentioned that, she  already ordered to hang the protesters  like the  Razakars (Criminals of war of independence in  1971) who have been hanged before.”

So what was the court’s findings about this conversation? In the 450 page document, the Tribunal does not include any section assessing the meaning of the recording, but instead in two places simply sets out its findings.

At p.371 the judgement states “We  find  that in  the conversation   with  Dhaka  University  Vice-Chancellor  A.S.M    Maksud   Kamal   accused  Sheikh  Hasina mentioned   that she  already  ordered to  hang the  students  as  the Razakars have  been  hanged  and  to  kill  them  like  the  students being  killed  in  United Kingdom.” This is in effect just a      repetition of the text in charge 2.

And at p.452, it states, after referring to the conversation, that  “It is  crystal  clear  that  Sheikh Hasina  … ordered  to  kill and  eliminate  the protesting students.”  

The “real” meaning of the Maksud Conversation

But do these recording support such findings?

The Tribunal quotes from two separate segments of the Maksud Hasina conversation. Since the Judgement does not include any discussion of this conversation, it is not entirely clear which segment is considered to include evidence that the former prime minister had “ordered  to  kill and  eliminate  the protesting students,” or whether it is a combination of both. We will therefore look at each in turn.

The Bangla for the first extract  is: ‘রাজাকার তো ফাঁসি দিছি, এবার তোদেরও তাই করব। একটাও ছাড়ব না, আমি বলে দিছি।’    

The English translation of the first      three phrases are relatively straightforward. “I’ve hanged Rajakars; now I’ll do the same to you (them). I won’t spare a single one.”

However the final phrase “আমি বলে দিছি” has different meanings, and can be translated in a number of ways: It could be: “I have told [them”.

“I have already said” ; or  “I have already ordered”. All are possible.
Indeed, the uncertainty over what Hasina meant when she used this phrase is evident within the final judgment itself.

When discussing the criminal charges, and in the Tribunal’s own findings (set out above), the phrase is translated as “I have already ordered.” Yet in the full translated transcript of the conversation, set out in the judgment, the same phrase appears as “I have told you.” The judgment offers no explanation for why it adopts one meaning of the words in one context and a different meaning in another.

Moreover, had the Tribunal properly considered the context of the conversation, it would have been very difficult for it to legitimately conclude that the phrase “I have already ordered” referred to any instruction by Hasina “to kill” protestors.

First, within the conversation itself, any “ordering” refers explicitly to “the hanging of the Rajakars,” as had been done in the past. The executions of the Jamaat-e-Islami leaders to which she was referring took place only after they were arrested, detained, and subjected to a judicial process. The prosecution has presented no evidence that Hasina intended to round up protestors, put them on trial, and have them executed, or that she issued any order of that nature, or that anything of the kind had even been discussed within government.

Secondly, even if the Tribunal believed that Hasina was speaking metaphorically—and that her reference to “hanging the Rajakars” was really a coded way of saying she had ordered the killing of student protestors, as the judges appear to suggest—the case for such an interpretation remains unsupported.

If such an order had been given, to whom was it delivered? The prosecution presented no evidence that any such instruction was communicated to anyone before the conversation on 14 July, or indeed immediately after this conversation occurred. One would expect that, at a minimum, the Inspector General of Police would have been informed, yet neither his confessional statement nor his testimony before the Tribunal mentions anything of this kind.

Thirdly, the suggestion that she issued an “order to kill” on 14 July sits uneasily with (and is arguably contradictory to) the prosecution’s own evidence—accepted by the Tribunal—that she gave an order to use lethal weapons on 18 July. That later order is supported by a clear intercepted conversation and corroborated by the testimony of the IGP. Is the prosecution, and by extension the Tribunal, claiming that she issued the same order twice?

Fourthly, events on the ground in the following days do not reflect the claim that an “order to kill” been issued on 14 July, it. No killings occurred on 15 July—something one might reasonably expect if such an order had been given the day before. And while five killings occurred on 16 July—one in Rangpur, two in Dhaka, and three in Chittagong, attributed either to law enforcement or Awami League activists—they are far more plausibly explained as sporadic acts of shooting, rather than as evidence of a coordinated national policy arising from an order to kill.

However, perhaps it is the second extract of the conversation that the Tribunal considered significant.  The Bangla for the second extract is: সব এইগুলাকে বাইর করে দিতে হবে... আমি বলে দিচ্ছি  আজকে সহ্য করার পরে এরেস্ট করবে, ধরে নেবে এবং যা অ্যাকশন নেয়ার নেবে... কারণ ইংল্যান্ডে এরকম ছাত্ররাজনীতির জন্য মাঠে নামলো, কতগুলি মেরে ফেলায় দিলো না?

The Tribunal translates this as: “They all have to be ousted. I already ordered to arrest them after waiting this day to take appropriate action as same as that that of England where protesting students were killed.”

The suggestion given by this translation is that she had not only “ordered” to arrest the students but also to do what happened in England where (supposedly) “students were killed.”

However the Tribunal’s translation is not accurate. It should be: “All of these people must be kicked out… I’m giving the order; let today pass and after that arrest them, detain them and take whatever action is necessary. Because in England, when they came out to the street for this kind of student politics — they simply killed a number of them, didn’t they?”

The meaning is far more nuanced than the crude translation the Tribunal gives to it.  And it certainly does not support an interpretation that it proves Hasina “ordered to kill and eliminate  the protesting students” which the Tribunal suggests.

One part of this sentence is clear. When Hasina says, “I’m giving the order,” she is referring to an “order” to remove public university students from their halls of residence. And this is something that did happen a couple of days later. And she is saying this directly to the person who can implement the order in Dhaka university.

However, it is far from clear that anything else Hasina says in that sentence—including “let today pass and then I will arrest them, detain them, and take whatever action is necessary” (with the implication that “whatever action is necessary” could include killings)—refers to any “order” she allegedly issued on the 14th or immediately thereafter.

In addition, as outlined above in relation to the first segment of the conversation, neither the context nor the prosecution’s own evidence supports the claim that any such order was actually given.

It is far more accurate to interpret Hasina’s remarks in this segment as part of the thought process that ultimately culminated in her order of 18 July authorising the use of lethal weapons against students—an order for which there is substantial evidence.

Since the judgment contains no discussion of the Hasina–Maksud conversation, we have no way of knowing how the Tribunal reached its conclusions—or whether it considered any of the issues outlined above. The more plausible explanation is that it simply accepted the prosecution’s claims wholesale. Given that this conversation is the central piece of evidence for Charge 1, and that it is open to interpretations very different from the one adopted by the Tribunal, the judges’ failure to explain their reasoning is deeply problematic.

#David Bergman is a journalist.
*Facebook account: david.bergman.77377
*The views expressed are those of the author.