DHAKA (Kyodo) -- Bangladesh's ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and former Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan were sentenced to death on Monday by a special tribunal for crimes against humanity committed during a lethal crackdown on an uprising.

Hasina fled to India last year amid a student-led uprising demanding the abolition of a quota system that allegedly granted job privileges to the children of freedom fighters who fought in the 1971 liberation war against Pakistan.

A former police chief who later turned state's witness was sentenced to five years in prison.

Hasina, daughter of Bangladesh's founding father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, served as prime minister from 1996 to 2001 and from 2009 to 2024. The verdict against her was announced Monday by the locally constituted international crimes tribunal amid tight security.

As Hasina has indicated she has no intention of returning to Bangladesh, the likelihood that the sentence will be carried out is extremely low even if the verdict becomes final, according to media reports.