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The offices of the Jatiya Party, which was allied with Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League, were set on fire by angry protesters on Thursday night amid clashes.
Protesters damaged Jatiya Party’s office in Dhaka and defaced a poster of party founder Muhammad Ershad. (ANI)
A Bangladeshi party allied with ousted Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League decried protesters who attacked and set its central office in Dhaka on fire after clashes on Thursday night. The office was partly damaged, witnesses said.
The Jatiya Party, founded by late President Hussain Muhammad Ershad, was a part of the Awami League-led Grand Alliance and participated previous three general elections which the Khaleda Zia-led Bangladeshi Nationalist Party (BNP) boycotted.
Protesters against Sheikh Hasina were angered when Jatiya Party announced that it would hold a rally in Dhaka on Saturday. Clashes erupted when protesters carrying the Chhatra Sramik Janata banner marched with a torch procession in front of the Jatiya Party’s central office in the Kakrail area, the heart of the capital Dhaka, news agency ANI reported.
According to witnesses, a large group of protesters gathered in front of the Jatiya Party office after protesters vandalized it, damaging the sign and defacing a picture of party founder Ershad. The fire service responded promptly and extinguished the blaze while police and military personnel were deployed at the scene.
‘Country Is Now Divided: Jatiya Party Chief
Reacting to the arson attack by furious protesters, Jatiya Party chief Ghulam Muhammed Quader, a former commerce minister under Hasina, accused the protesters of “splitting” the nation. “The country is now divided”, Quader was quoted as saying by AFP.
“They disregard everyone else, splitting the country into ‘pure’ and ‘impure’ factions… They determine who is culpable and who is not, leaving no room for justification. Once they tag someone as culpable, it’s final,” he added.
Hasina was ousted after a student-led protests against her government’s controversial quota system for government jobs spiralled into a full-fledged agitation against the Awami League, causing her to resign and flee to India on August 5. Many of the student protest leaders are now part of the interim cabinet led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus.
Since Hasina’s ouster, dozens of Hasina loyalists have been arrested by the police in Bangladesh. “They decide everything — they can vandalise, set fire to our offices, and remain above the law,” Quader said, without specifying names.
Hasnat Abdullah, convener of Students Against Discrimination, the protest group credited with sparking the uprising against Hasina, had on Thursday urged supporters to march on the Jatiya Party offices. He called on students in a social media post to “annihilate the national traitor”.
UN Praises Bangladeshi Students Despite Attacks On Hindus
The incident took place days after UN rights chief Volker Turk praised students in Dhaka for their “courage in standing up for justice”, while warning that they must also take care of the risks ahead. “Beware of the idea that the ends justify the means,” Turk said in a speech at Dhaka University on Tuesday.
“The process through which you seek change is just as crucial as the outcome. Strengthening institutions can be more important in the long term than tearing them down,” he added.
Notably, hundreds of Hindus were killed in July and August during a student agitation that escalated into massive protests, while several Hindu temples and businesses were vandalised by the protesters. Yunus’ interim government has struggled to address Islamist attacks on Bangladeshi Hindus, Christians, adivasis, and hill tribes.
(with inputs from agencies)
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- Location :
Dhaka, Bangladesh