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DAWN.com
Three years on, its first verdicts have plunged the country into one of its most turbulent chapters since independence from Pakistan four decades ago and threatens lasting damage to the world’s eighth most populous country.
More than 80 people have been killed in protests, thousands of tourists have been forced to flee and a series of strikes have pummelled an economy which had enjoyed annual growth rates of around six per cent over the last 10 years.
“The verdicts and the subsequent violence have set Bangladesh on the road to a protracted conflict, which may leave permanent damage to society,” said Attaur Rahman, a Bangladesh expert based at the State University of New York.
The former East Pakistan declared independence from Islamabad in December 1971 at the end of a nine-month civil war in which the government says three million people were killed. Independent estimates put the figure much lower.
The Dhaka-based International Crimes Tribunal, which was set up in March 2010, is trying around a dozen defendants over their role in the war and has so far convicted three Islamists, two of whom have been sentenced to death.
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