Former City Minister Tulip Siddiq is likely to face a 10-year prison sentence on Monday if she is found guilty in a high-profile corruption trial in her native Bangladesh.
Ms Siddiq, 43, is accused of pressuring her aunt Sheikh Hasina – Bangladesh’s ousted prime minister – to gift plots of land to her UK-based mother, Sheikh Rehana, 70, her elder brother Radwan, 45, and her younger sister Azmina, 35, in an exclusive residential area of the capital Dhaka.
Ms Siddiq – who was Labour‘s anti-corruption minister – has always denied the charges, accusing the Bangladeshi authorities of mounting a political witch-hunt against her.
But if she is found guilty and handed such a long prison term in absentia, the MP for Hampstead and Highgate is likely to face renewed calls to stand down as a parliamentarian.
She faced such calls in January after having to resign as Treasury minister over corruption allegations.
Political observers in Bangladesh said last night that Ms Siddiq is ‘highly likely’ to be convicted, as her aunt, Hasina, 78, was found guilty in the same case last Thursday and sentenced to 23 years in prison.
The former PM – who governed Bangladesh for 15 years and is currently living in exile in India – has already been sentenced to death for ordering the killings of civilians during nationwide protests against her rule in August last year, which led to her ousting.
Last week, prominent British lawyers and former ministers, led by Cherie Blair KC, signed a joint letter where they said the trial against Ms Siddiq was ‘contrived and unfair.’
Former City Minister Tulip Siddiq is likely to face a 10-year prison sentence on Monday if she is found guilty in a high-profile corruption trial in her native Bangladesh
Ms Siddiq’s aunt Sheikh Hasina (pictured in 2023) was found guilty in the same case last Thursday and sentenced to 23 years in prison
The letter, sent to the Bangladesh High Commissioner to the UK, Abida Islam, adds: ‘She [Siddiq] is being tried in her absence without justification and that the proceedings fall far short of standards of fairness recognised internationally.’
Mrs Blair and her co-signatories add: ‘A lawyer in Bangladesh she appointed to represent her was forced to stand down, reporting that he had been placed under house arrest, further informing Ms Siddiq that his daughter had been threatened.’
Ms Siddiq resigned from her position as Economic Secretary to the Treasury after the Daily Mail revealed in December she was being investigated in Bangladesh in a £4billion bribery case.
She and members of her family were accused of siphoning off £4billion from a Russian-built nuclear power plant deal, a claim Ms Siddiq has always denied.
Weeks later, the Mail on Sunday revealed how she lied to the newspaper three years earlier when she told its reporters her parents bought her a flat in London’s King’s Cross, when in fact it was gifted to her by a political ally of her aunt.
An inquiry by the independent watchdog on Ministerial Standards, Sir Lauri Magnus, said Ms Siddiq did not breach the Minister Code, but should have been more alert to the ‘reputational risks’ from her ‘close family’s association with Bangladesh.’
Last night, neither Mrs Blair nor Mr Buckland responded to the MoS, but Mr Grieve said ‘The letter was based on credible information and evidence made available to us. I have nothing to add about the matter.’
Ms Siddiq declined to comment on the trial or the letter.
