SC stays till July 5 fine on Dr Zafrullah slapped by Int'l Crimes Tribunal

The Supreme Court yesterday stayed till July 5 the International Crimes Tribunal's verdict that had fined Gonoshasthaya Kendra founder Zafrullah Chowdhury Tk 5,000 for criticising the punishment of Dhaka-based British journalist David Bergman by the same court.

Chamber judge of the Appellate Division Justice Hasan Foez Siddique passed the order following a petition filed by Zafrullah. The judge also sent the petition to the full bench of the Appellate Division for its hearing on July 5.

For committing the contempt of court, the tribunal-2 on June 10 gave Zafrullah one-hour's jail sentence in the dock and fined him Tk 5,000 to be paid within yesterday (in seven days), in default, to suffer one month in jail.

On December 2 last year, Bergman was sentenced to imprisonment "till rising of the court" on the day of the verdict and fined Tk 5,000.

On December 20, Prothom Alo ran a report titled "50 people express concern over the punishment of Bergman" based on their statement against the verdict on Bergman.  Later, a contempt of court charge was brought against them.

The tribunal, however, acquitted 22 eminent citizens of the contempt charge while it earlier exonerated 26 signatories from the charge as they apologised unconditionally. Another signatory withdrew the name from the statement.