By Ruma Paul
DHAKA (Reuters) -Not less than 73 folks have been killed and tons of injured in clashes in Bangladesh on Sunday, as police fired tear gasoline and rubber bullets to disperse tens of 1000’s of protesters calling for Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to resign.
The federal government declared an indefinite nationwide curfew beginning at 6 p.m. (1200 GMT) on Sunday, the primary time it has taken such a step throughout the present protests that started final month. It additionally introduced a three-day common vacation ranging from Monday.
The unrest, which has prompted the federal government to close down web companies, is Hasina’s largest check in her 20-year regime after she gained a fourth straight time period in elections that have been boycotted by the principle opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Get together.
Critics of Hasina, together with human rights teams, have accused her authorities of utilizing extreme pressure towards protesters, a cost she and her ministers deny.
Demonstrators blocked main highways on Sunday as pupil protesters launched a non-cooperation program to press for the federal government’s resignation, and violence unfold nationwide.
“Those that are protesting on the streets proper now will not be college students, however terrorists who’re out to destabilise the nation,” Hasina mentioned after a nationwide safety panel assembly, attended by the chiefs of the military, navy, air pressure, police and different companies.
“I enchantment to our countrymen to suppress these terrorists with a powerful hand.”
Police stations and ruling occasion places of work have been focused as violence rocked the nation of 170 million folks.
Twelve policemen have been crushed to loss of life within the north-western district of Sirajganj, police official Bijoy Bosak mentioned.
Not less than eight folks, together with two college students and a ruling occasion chief, have been killed and dozens injured amid fierce clashes in a number of locations within the capital, Dhaka, police and witnesses mentioned.
BULLET WOUNDS
Two development employees have been killed on their option to work and 30 injured within the central district of Munsiganj, throughout a three-way conflict of protesters, police and ruling occasion activists, witnesses mentioned.
“They have been introduced lifeless to the hospital with bullet wounds,” mentioned Abu Hena Mohammad Jamal, the superintendent of the district hospital.
Police mentioned that they had not fired any dwell bullets.
Within the northeastern district of Pabna, no less than three folks have been killed and 50 injured throughout a conflict between protesters and activists of Hasina’s ruling Awami League occasion, witnesses mentioned.
Three folks have been killed in violence within the northern district of Bogura, and 53 have been killed in 12 different districts, hospital officers mentioned.
“An assault on a hospital is unacceptable,” mentioned Well being Minister Samanta Lal Sen after a gaggle vandalised a medical school hospital and set hearth to autos, together with an ambulance, in Dhaka.
For the second time throughout the current protests, the federal government shut down high-speed web companies, cellular operators mentioned. Social media platforms Fb (NASDAQ:) and WhatsApp weren’t obtainable, even through broadband connections.
Bangladesh authorities instructed the nation’s telecoms suppliers on Sunday to close down 4G, successfully disabling web companies, in response to a confidential authorities memo seen by Reuters.
GOVERNMENT ORDERS
“You’re requested to close down all of your 4G companies till additional discover, solely 2G will likely be efficient,” mentioned the doc issued by the Nationwide Telecommunication Monitoring Middle, a authorities intelligence company.
Telecoms firms have been beforehand informed their licences could be cancelled if they didn’t adjust to authorities orders, an individual with direct information informed Reuters.
The telecom regulatory physique didn’t reply to Reuters’ calls.
Final month, no less than 150 folks have been killed and 1000’s injured in violence touched off by pupil teams protesting towards quotas for presidency jobs.
The protests paused after the Supreme Court docket scrapped most quotas, however college students returned to the streets in sporadic protests final week, demanding justice for the households of these killed.
“I believe the genie is out of the bottle and Hasina might not put it again within the bottle once more,” mentioned Shakil Ahmed, affiliate professor for presidency and politics at Jahangirnagar College.
“The prime minister ought to instantly kind a nationwide authorities to facilitate larger unity.”
Chief of Military Employees Common Waker-Uz-Zaman on Saturday directed his officers to make sure the safety of individuals’s lives, properties, and necessary state installations underneath any circumstances, a press release mentioned.
“(The) Bangladesh Military is an emblem of the folks’s belief. The military is at all times there and can at all times be there for the folks’s pursuits and for any wants of the state,” the assertion quoted him as saying.
He additionally urged officers to stay vigilant about “numerous rumours” circulating on social media and to execute their duties with honesty, integrity, and justice. Zaman will temporary the media on Monday.
