Islamist leader to be executed after sentence upheld

The leader of Bangladesh's top Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami is set to hang within days after the Supreme Court on Thursday upheld his death sentence for war crimes.

Motiur Rahman Nizami was convicted of murder, rape and orchestrating the killing of intellectuals during the country's 1971 independence struggle.

"We're satisfied. Now there is no bar to execute him unless he seeks clemency from the president and the president pardons him," said Attorney General Mahbubey Alam after the Supreme Court dismissed Nizami's final appeal.