Dhaka: A Bangladesh court sentenced on Monday, seven top Islamist militants to death for killing two judges in a bomb attack in southern Jhalakati town in November last year.
"They will be hanged until death," Judge, Reza Tarik Ahmed said in his verdict.
The seven included chiefs of two outlawed groups - Shayek Abdur Rahman of Jamaat-ul Mujahideen and Siddik-ul-Islam of Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh.
"I pronounce this highest penalty as involvement of the accused has been proved beyond doubt," the judge said in a courtroom packed with lawyers and security officers, witnesses said.
All except one of the convicts are in custody, told the police. The other convict who is on the run was faced with a trial earlier.
The bomb blast had killed two judges when the bomb was thrown at the vehicle carrying them to a court in Jhalakati, 300 km (187 miles) south of the capital Dhaka, on November 14, 2005.
The outlawed groups, trying to turn Muslim dominated Bangladesh into a sharia-based Islamic country, killed at least 30 people and wounded around 150 in a spate of countrywide bomb attacks between August and December last year.
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