Dhaka, Nov 30 (ANI): The leaders of Workers Party of Bangladesh held a rally in Dhaka to demand ban on main Islamist party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and speedy trial of the war criminals to build a secular nation. The 1971 war of liberation, in which an estimated three million people died in nine months, is a festering wound not only for those personally affected, but also for many young Bangladeshis. Leaders and hundreds of party workers held placards and flags at the rally demanding ban on militant forces. A former leader of Bangladesh's ruling party was sentenced to death by a war crimes tribunal on November 24 in connection with atrocities committed during the country's war of independence from Pakistan. The war crimes tribunals have angered Islamists who call them a politically motivated attempt by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to persecute the leadership of Jamaat-e-Islami, a key part of the opposition coalition.
