The process of WC trials had started within one year of independence, in 1972, with the formulation of the Collaborators Act 1972 and the International Crimes (Tribunal) Act 1973. The core aim of the 1973 Act was to provide for the detention, prosecution and punishment of persons for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and other crimes under international law. After independence, the Awami League (AL) government had taken several initiatives to bring the perpetrators of the 1971 War Crimes to justice, particularly those who, in the name of organisations like Razakars, Al-Badar, and Al-Shams, had directly and indirectly assisted the Pakistan military forces to commit monstrous crimes like mass murder, rape, torture, looting, arson and destruction. Accordingly, under the Collaborators and ICT Acts, several tribunals were constituted for the trial of WCs and a few convictions were secured. After the murder of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1975, however, the Collaborators Act of 1972 was repealed and the Constitution was amended once again to allow religion-based communal politics to flourish, and the JeI to re-establish itself in the country. The WCs trial process was blocked and, for the following three decades, a succession of military administrations swept aside all attempts to secure justice, fearing that many among their own ranks could be brought into the scope of the trials. Successive government freed more than 10,000 war crime suspects, and the trials were completely frozen after the political turmoil of 1975, and virtually buried thereafter. The weak coalition government of the AL between 1996 an 2001 failed to push aggressively for a restoration of the processes.
The 2008 Election Manifesto of AL, in its "Charter for Change", however, openly blamed the military governments and ‘political parties formed in the cantonment’ (a reference to the Bangladesh National Party, BNP) of rehabilitating the War Criminals. The trial of WCs was listed among the "Five Priority Issues" in the Manifesto, which declared, "Trial of war criminals will be arranged".
In 2009, the Bangladesh Parliament passed amendment to the Act of 1973 to bring to trial people responsible for severe human rights violations and crimes against humanity during the Liberation War of 1971, though the law still falls short of international standards. Bangladesh’s ICT was constituted on March 25, 2010. The Tribunal includes three High Court judges and six investigators retired from Civilian, Law Enforcement and Military careers. On June 25, 2010, Chief Justice Nizamul Haque issued warrants against five members of JeI – Chief Matiur Rahman Nizami, secretary general Ali Ahsan Muhammad Mujaheed, deputy chief Delwar Hossain Sayedee, senior leaders Mohammad Kamaruzzaman and Abdul Qader Mollah – along with BNP member Salauddin Quader Chowdhury alias Shaka Chowdhury, who were charged with sedition and war crimes, including genocide, rape, torture, looting, arson. Among them, Nizami, Mujaheed and Sayedee were arrested on June 29, 2010, Kamruzamman and Mollah on July 13, 2010, and Salauddin on December 16, 2010.
This initiation of the WC trials seeks to bring to justice the men, prominently including the top leadership of the JeI, who collaborated with the Pakistan Army and Government in the genocide of an estimated three million people during the Liberation War, and in the use of rape and collective slaughters as instruments of State policy.