Sun 1 Jun 2008
Photo: Star Members of the joint forces pick up a man and search for arms at Hatirjheel of Madhubagh in the capital during a drive yesterday
1,637 held as crackdown on political men goes on
Kishoreganj : The joint forces arrested 44 persons including listed criminals. They also conducted raids on the residences of several AL and BNP leaders.
Faridpur: The joint forces and police arrested 14 persons including Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee Faridpur unit President Mahbubur Rahman Khan.
Chandpur reports: At least eight persons, including AL and BNP leaders, were arrested in separate drives.
Sirajganj reports: Rab arrested two persons including a Jubo Dal leader in separate drives in Sirajganj.
Rajshahi: the joint forces yesterday held two Awami League leaders at Puthia upazila in the district.
Rangpur: joint forces arrested district BNP joint secretary Masud Khan from his Jummapara residence on Saturday night.
Chapainawabganj: joint forces in separate drives arrested AL activist Abdul Malek of Bholahat upazila and Jamaat activist Habibur Rahman Hobi of Gomostapur early yesterday. They were handed over to police.
Khulna : six people including Khulna city AL leader Birendra Nath Ghose were arrested by joint forces on Saturday night and yesterday.
Bogra: Krishak League president Mamunur Rashid and 15 others were arrested on charge of taking drugs.
The other arrestees are Al leader Bulu Biswas, Jubo League leader Rafiqul Islam, Jatiya Party leader Moniruzzaman Elu, Zahidur Rahman and Imran Khan.
New Age Editorial
Arbitrary arrests can never strengthen democracy
WE ARE alarmed by the initiation of fresh drives by the military-controlled interim government to arrest grassroots politicians from around the country. Although the inspector general of police has claimed that these are routine drives to contain crime and have not been triggered by any political motive, it is evident from the identities of most of those detained thus far that the regime has decided once again to tighten the noose around the Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party. It is also probably not a coincidence that these drives come at a time when both the BNP and the Awami League have decided to pull out of planned dialogues with the government and have hinted at initiating movements to free their detained leaders and to bring to an end the ongoing state of emergency. Leaders of both parties have already condemned the new arrests and have stated that these are, in their opinion, nothing more than the latest attempts by the regime to frighten politicians into submission.
Our anxiety about these fresh arrests stems from the fact that the current regime is doing nothing but making a bad situation worse. Already the country is reeling under a state of emergency that has suspended the fundamental rights of citizens as granted by our constitution, has put restrictions on the people’s right to seek bail and to move the courts and has attempted to muzzle the free press and control the flow of information. The people are not only being governed by a regime that they did not chose and have little control over, they are being made to live as prisoners in their own land, unable to raise their voice or create a platform to protest even when the prices of essential commodities like food have gone nearly out of the reach of the vast majority.
Under this repressive state of emergency, the government, during its prolonged tenure, have arrested some 440,000 people, according to a recent report of the UK-based Amnesty International. Besides, the 69 jails of the country are bursting at the seams as they are currently home to over 90,000 detainees, including the high-level politicians and businessmen who were the early targets of this regime. A spate of new stories in different newspapers has reported on the abysmal state within our prisons at present and a recent story in this paper reported that there are only 16 doctors for the over 90,000 detainees in our prisons.
The regime now apparently wants to add to that figure by arresting more politicians, although the focus seems to have shifted to grassroots level politicians who are essential for the parties to mobilise public support against the government and who would undoubtedly stand in the way of any plan by the government to set up a political platform at the grassroots through the holding of local government polls. However, the arbitrary arrest of politicians cannot and will not strengthen democracy. Hence, we would like to remind the government that instead of arresting more people in its endless quest to weaken the political parties in order to cling to power, it would do better to lift the suffocating state of emergency that has made us all prisoners in our own land and to hold parliamentary elections in order to allow the people to be governed by their elected representatives.
June 5th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
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June 6th, 2008 at 4:11 am
Police chief Nur Mohammad gave the nation good lectures on how the police was used by politicians and those days are over etc. Now a days he is using police force for pure political ambition of his bosses and still continuing all his lies about these arrests.
It is not clear to me if those arrested are indeed petty criminals, why they would have to be arrested under emergency power rule?
June 14th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Everyday on way back home from work I see prison van load of political prisoners taken out of Dhaka who were picked up by the interim undemocratic junta’s secret police apparatus the previous night. This scene is no different then what the BNP-Jamaat government was doing to AL supporters prior to the so-called 111.
Even alarming is the meeting today of the foreign advisor with retired jobless diplomats to warm foreign countries not to interfere in our internal affairs.
Since this is an unelected undemocratic government I think all democracy-loving nations should force this illegtimate junta to hold elections asap and exit with honor before people take to the streets.
The finance advisor also was taking credit for doing this, that and the other. Absolutely ridiculous! This is exactly what happens when people who had never dreamed of getting elected by the people somehow manages to get into power through the back door due to blunder on part of a big player (here BNP).
These stupid advisors have forgotten the fact that their only task was to hold elections in 90 days, which they have willfully violated, and then depart at the earliest.
I am sure in future we will see many of them being paraded in the blue prison vans for violating Bangladesh’s constitution.
What democracy are you talking about! Bangladesh is in the hands of Hyenas backed by unscrupulous people like Yunus, Abed, Kamal Hossain, Ataur Rahman, Enam Ahmed Choudhury, Farukh Ahmed Choudhury, Shamsher Mobin, Walliur Rahman, Rehman Sobhan, Farukh Sobhan, Major Hafiz,etc whose lust for power will soon be fulfilled by the people of Bangladesh!