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Bangladeshi war criminal Ghulam Azam has died, aged 91, from a heart attack just over a year after being sentenced to 90 years in prison for masterminding atrocities during the country's independence war.
Azam was the head of Jamaat-e-Islami - the country's largest Islamist party - when Bangladesh, then known as East Pakistan, fought a brutal nine-month war against Pakistan in 1971.
A special war court set up by the country's secular government found Azam guilty in July last year of five charges of planning, conspiracy, incitement, complicity and murder during the war.
Azam "died of cardiac arrest at 10.10pm" on Thursday at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University hospital in the capital Dhaka, the director of the clinic Abdul Majid Bhuiyan said.
He became the second war crime convict to die in custody after Abdul Alim, a senior official of the main opposition party, died in August.
Azam's son, Abdullahel Azmi, said earlier his father's condition had deteriorated and doctors had put him on life support.
"He was suffering from old age complications. He also did not get adequate care in the hospital," his lawyer, Tajul Islam, said, adding that Azam would be buried in a family graveyard in Dhaka after his funeral yesterday.
Azam's conviction last year sparked deadly protests by hardline Islamists and widespread celebrations among secular groups.
There was no immediate comment from the government to Azam's death and security was tight at the hospital as hundreds of Islamists gathered outside after the death was announced around midnight.
Secular protesters staged impromptu "victory" marches at Dhaka University, hailing Azam's death.
During his trial, Azam was described as the "architect" of pro-Pakistani militias responsible for many atrocities during the war, in which three million people were killed.
When India intervened at the end of the brutal conflict, the militias killed dozens of professors, playwrights, filmmakers, doctors and journalists.
Many of the bodies were found a few days after the war at a marsh outside Dhaka, blindfolded and with their hands tied behind their backs.
Azam was described as the "mastermind" behind the massacre of the intellectuals.
Prosecutors compared him to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and sought the death penalty but he was spared execution because of his age.
Under his leadership Jamaat opposed secession from what was then West Pakistan, which lay 2,000km away, with only Islam, the majority faith, binding the two peoples together.
After independence, Bangladesh cancelled Azam's citizenship and banned Jamaat and other faith-based parties when it adopted a secular constitution.
Azam returned to Bangladesh bearing a Pakistani passport in 1978, three years after the nation's founding leader Sheikh Mujib was assassinated. A junta was in power that permitted Islamist parties to operate openly.
His political rehabilitation was complete in 1993 when the Supreme Court returned his citizenship. After the judgment, he offered some regret for past activities but fell short of giving a full apology for his wartime role.
A wily political operator, Azam played the role of kingmaker throughout the 1990s, in the process reviving the fortunes of the party, once banned and universally loathed for its horrific wartime role.


Heart attack kills war criminal Ghulam Azam, the ‘Hitler’ of Bangladesh

A supporter holds a poster of Ghulam Azam at a protest against his imprisonment. Photo: EPA

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War criminal Ghulam Azam was just one year into his 90-year jail term for masterminding the atrocities in the country's war of independence


Bangladeshi war criminal Ghulam Azam has died, aged 91, from a heart attack just over a year after being sentenced to 90 years in prison for masterminding atrocities during the country's independence war.


Heart attack kills war criminal Ghulam Azam, the ‘Hitler’ of Bangladesh

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}War criminal Ghulam Azam was just one year into his 90-year jail term for masterminding the atrocities in the country's war of independence

War criminal Ghulam Azam was just one year into his 90-year jail term for masterminding the atrocities in the country's war of independence