One person was killed in Bangladesh on Wednesday as violent protests erupted across the country after a court sentenced a senior Islamist leader to death for mass murder, police said.

A rickshaw driver died after being hit with stones during a protest in southern Bangladesh by supporters of the country's largest Islamist party.

Bangladesh's top court Tuesday sentenced to death a senior Islamist opposition official for murder during the 1971 liberation war against Pakistan.

Abdul Quader Molla, 65, the fourth-highest leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, is the first politician to be found guilty by the country's Supreme Court after it rejected an appeal to acquit him of all charges.

A two-day meeting of high street clothing brands and pressure groups aimed at reaching a compensation deal for victims of two Bangladesh factory disasters ended Thursday in failure, organizers said.

The Geneva talks came after a building housing garment factories collapsed in Bangladesh in April, killing more than 1,100 people. They were aimed at agreeing compensation for the families of those victims and those of other factory disasters.

One man died as police and supporters of Bangladesh's largest Islamist party clashed Wednesday in the capital during a strike called by the group.

The violence erupted in Dhaka as security forces sought to break up dozens of supporters of Jamaat-e-Islami, who were smashing cars, police said.

A Bangladeshi garment worker who spent 108 days in a coma after being badly injured in one of the world's worst industrial disasters has died, officials said on Monday.

Manwar Hossain, 22, was ironing clothes in one of the garment factories housed in the nine-story building outside the Bangladeshi capital when it collapsed on April 24, killing more than 1,100 people.

Families of some of the more than 50 sailors and fishermen held hostage by Somali pirates begged for their release Thursday, with some imprisoned now for more than two years.

"We are in desperate condition living with little hope to see our beloved soon," said the message from families of the crew of the MV Albedo, a Malaysian-flagged container ship with 15 sailors still held, from countries including Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka.

Bangladesh's main Islamist party was banned from contesting next year's election when the high court ruled Thursday that Jamaat-e-Islami's charter breached the country's secular constitution.

"It is hereby declared illegal," said Moazzem Hossain, the chief judge hearing the case amid tight security outside the courthouse in Dhaka.

Bangladeshi security forces have killed at least 150 protesters since February, using excessive force during demonstrations against war crime trials for top Islamists, a rights group said Thursday.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said security forces have also injured more than 2,000 protesters during the street rallies, and in some cases had targeted individuals for attack.

A Bangladesh court on Wednesday sentenced a leading Islamist politician to death for war crimes including murder, torture and kidnapping, as religious hardliners imposed a nationwide strike over the verdict.

Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid, 65, the second-highest ranked official of the country's largest Islamic party, was found guilty of five of seven charges by the much-criticized International Crimes Tribunal.

Bangladesh's army has rejected as "vile" newspaper reports that described the rescue of a textile worker trapped for 17 days in a collapsed garment factory as a hoax.

A pro-opposition Bangladeshi daily first reported the story last week, branding the rescue of seamstress Reshma as fake.