Dhaka, Sept. 2 (Reuters): Two former policemen convicted of the rape and killing of a teenager were executed by hanging in a north Bangladesh jail early today.

Senior prison official Mohammad Azizul Haque said it was the first time that a member of Bangladesh’s police force had been hanged.

“The two, Moinul Haq and Abdus Sattar, were hanged one minute past (yesterday) midnight,” he said at the Rangpur jail, 350 km north of Dhaka, where the sentences were carried out. The incident in the northern town of Dinajpur in 1995 sparked protests across the country, forcing the authorities to arrest the accused and put them on trial.

Accompanied by another policeman, the men kidnapped Yasmin, an 18-year-old housemaid who worked in the capital, late at night when she asked for a lift home in their police van after missing the last bus.

Awami patients

Twelve Awami League members, injured during an attack on a rally addressed by Sheikh Hasina Wajed on August 21, are undergoing treatment at a hospital in New Delhi. Two former ministers are among those being treated in Delhi.