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A Bangladesh court has sentenced Labour MP Tulip Siddiq to two years in prison after finding her guilty of corruption over a government land project.
Dhaka’s Special Judge’s Court found Ms Siddiq guilty of corruptly influencing her aunt, the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, to help her mother acquire a piece of land in the suburbs of the Bangladeshi capital.
Ms Siddiq’s mother, Sheikh Rehana, was given seven years in prison, while Ms Hasina was sentenced to five years in prison.
All were tried in absentia, and the MP for Hampstead and Highgate, who denied the allegations, is unlikely to serve the sentence as the UK does not have an extradition treaty with Bangladesh.
Ms Siddiq faces a number of cases in Bangladesh, which prompted her to resign as Keir Starmer’s anti-corruption minister in January this year.
Ms Hasina, who fled to India in August last year amid massive anti-government protests, has already been awarded a death sentence by a tribunal court in Bangladesh for committing crimes against humanity. Last week, she was handed a combined 21-year prison sentence in other corruption cases.
Prosecutors argued that the land in the Purbachal New Town project was unlawfully allocated through political influence and collusion with senior officials, accusing the defendants of abusing their authority to secure the plot, about 13,610 sq ft, during Ms Hasina’s tenure as prime minister.
Court documents claimed that Ms Siddiq “forced and influenced her aunt and the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina using her special power to secure [a plot of land] for her mother Rehana Siddiq, sister Azmina Siddiq and brother Radwan Siddiq”.
A total of 17 defendants were each fined TK100,000 (£620), or to serve an additional six months in prison if they fail to pay. The 14 other defendants were each sentenced to five years in prison.
Prosecutors said Ms Siddiq was tried as a Bangladeshi citizen after the authorities obtained her Bangladeshi passport, ID and tax number – a claim disputed by the Labour MP.
Her lawyers claimed that she “never had” a registered voter ID and has not “held a [Bangladeshi] passport since she was a child”.
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