Bangladesh charges 16 people for burning schoolgirl to death

Police have charged 16 people over the murder of a teenage girl who was set on fire at an religious seminary in eastern Bangladesh last month after accusing the headmaster of sexual assault, police said on Wednesday.

Nusrat Jahan, 19, died in hospital on April 10, five days after she was attacked at the Sonagazi Islamia Madrasa. The case sparked a nationwide outcry against sexual abuse and harassment.

She was taken by two classmates to the rooftop of the madrassa where the accused asked her to withdraw the case against headmaster Siraj Ud Dawla, according to Banaj Kumar Majumder, the head of the Police Bureau of Investigation.

When she refused, a group of five people poured kerosene on her and set her on fire, he said, adding that the accused had confessed.

Police submitted the charges against the headmaster and 15 associates to a court in the district of Feni, officer Mohammad Iqbal said, adding that he hoped the court would soon pass an indictment order to begin the trial.

Five of the accused were directly involved in the murder while the others helped them carry out their plan, he said. Investigators were seeking the death penalty for all of them.

At a news conference on Tuesday, Majumder said the headmaster had plotted the killing from jail after he was arrested in late March when Jahan's family filed a sexual harassment complaint against him.