Bangladesh Executes Motiur Rahman Nizami, leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami party for 1971 war crimes Tuesday May 10,2016

Bangladesh on Tuesday May 10,2016 executed the leader of the country's largest Islamist party for war crimes, officials said, a move set to exacerbate tensions in the volatile Muslim-majority nation.

Motiur Rahman Nizami, leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, was hanged at a prison in the capital Dhaka, just days after the nation's highest court dismissed his final appeal to overturn the death sentence for atrocities committed during the country's 1971 war of independence with Pakistan.

Law and Justice minister Anisul Huq told AFP the 73-year-old leader was hanged just before midnight (1800 GMT) after he refused to seek mercy from the country's president.

Motiur Rahman Nizami is the fifth and highest-ranked opposition leader -- and the fourth from Jamaat -- to have been executed since December 2013 for war crimes despite global criticism of their trials.

Bangladesh Independence War, 1971

• Civil war erupts in Pakistan, pitting the West Pakistan army against East Pakistanis demanding autonomy and later independence

• Fighting forces an estimated 10 million East Pakistani civilians to flee to India

• In December, India invades East Pakistan in support of the East Pakistani people

• Pakistani army surrenders at Dhaka and its army of more than 90,000 become Indian prisoners of war

• East Pakistan becomes the independent country of Bangladesh on 16 December 1971

• Exact number of people killed is unclear - Bangladesh says it is three million but independent researchers put the figure at up to 500,000 fatalities.