Tag: BANGLADESH

21,000 Rohingya flee to Bangladesh from Myanmar: IOM

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) – by Shafiqul ALAM More than 20,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh in recent weeks, humanitarian officials said on Tuesday, following a bloody crackdown by the army in neighbouring Myanmar. Bangladesh has stepped up patrols on the border to try to stem the tide of refugees since an eruption of unrest in Myanmar’s western state of Rakhine in early October. But Sanjukta Sahany, head of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) office […]

China, Bangladesh lift ties to strategic partnership of cooperation

Dhaka, Bangladesh (Reuters) — Visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping held talks with Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Friday and the two leaders agreed to upgrade bilateral ties to a strategic partnership of cooperation. During the meeting, Xi said that the closer comprehensive partnership of cooperation the two sides forged in 2010 has yielded fruitful results, with bilateral cooperation advancing steadily in political, economic, cultural, and security, as well as on international and regional affairs. […]

At least 15 dead in Bangladesh factory fire

  DHAKA, Bangladesh  (AFP) — At least fifteen people have been killed and 70 injured, many critically, in a huge fire triggered by a boiler explosion at a Bangladeshi packaging factory, officials said Saturday. “The death toll has risen to 15 and at least 70 people have been injured,” Parvez Mia, a doctor at the Tongi state-run hospital, told AFP. “Most of them had burn injuries. We sent the critically injured victims to the hospitals in Dhaka,” […]

Bangladesh hangs top financier of largest Islamist party

  DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Bangladesh hanged a wealthy tycoon and top financial backer of its largest Islamist party late Saturday for war crimes, dealing a massive blow to the group’s ambitions in the Muslim-majority nation. Mir Quasem Ali, a key leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, was executed after being convicted by a controversial war crimes tribunal for offences committed during the 1971 independence conflict with Pakistan. The 63-year-old was hanged at the Kashimpur high […]

Bangladesh kicks out N. Korea diplomat over smuggled goods

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Bangladesh has kicked out a North Korean diplomat after he was caught smuggling more than one million cigarettes as well as electronics into the country in a shipping container, Dhaka officials said Monday. Han Son Ik, the first secretary of the North Korean embassy in Dhaka, has been ordered to leave the country after failing to declare the goods worth nearly half a million dollars to customs. Bangladesh foreign secretary Shahidul […]

Bangladesh reels from new deadly attack at start of Eid

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Suspected Islamists carried out another deadly attack in Bangladesh Thursday at the country’s biggest prayer service for the start of Eid, days after a mass murder of hostages in the capital Dhaka. Authorities said two policemen and an attacker had been killed after several explosions near a prayer ground in the district of Kishoreganj as at least 250,000 people joined a traditional post-Ramadan gathering. An officer stationed in the northern district’s […]

Policeman dead after Bangladesh Eid prayer attack

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — At least one policeman was killed and five others wounded Thursday following an explosion and a gunbattle near a mass prayer gathering to celebrate Eid in northern Bangladesh, police said. Only days after 20 hostages were murdered by suspected Islamists in Dhaka, police and local media reported a new attack by jihadists near a prayer ground where at least 200,000 people were marking the end of Ramadan in the northern Kishoreganj […]

Bangladesh in mourning after hostage bloodbath

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Bangladesh began observing two days of national mourning Sunday after 20 hostages were slaughtered at a restaurant packed with foreigners in a terrifying escalation of a campaign of attacks by Islamist extremists. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina decreed the mourning period as she vowed to drag Bangladesh back from the brink, warning of a concerted bid to turn one of the world’s most populous nations into a failed state. Amid mass condemnation of […]

Bangladesh PM ‘determined to root out terrorism’

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said she was determined to eradicate terrorism in Bangladesh Saturday after security forces stormed a cafe where Islamist extremists had taken dozens of diners hostage. “It was an extremely heinous act. What kind of Muslims are these people? They don’t have any religion,” she said in a televised speech. “People must resist these terrorists. My government is determined to root out terrorism and militancy from Bangladesh.” © […]

Bangladesh commandos end hostage siege, kill six gunmen

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Bangladesh security forces ended a siege Saturday after storming a cafe in Dhaka where dozens of diners had been held captive through the night and shot dead six of the hostage-takers. Police said at least 13 hostages, including three foreigners, had been rescued after commandos took control of the cafe in the upmarket Gulshan quarter but added that there had been an unknown number of casualties. Two police officers were also […]

13 hostages rescued after Bangladesh siege: commander

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Thirteen hostages have been rescued after security forces ended a siege at a cafe in the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka on Saturday, a top commander said. “Three of them are foreigners. Ten locals,” Tuhin Mohammad Masud, a commander of the elite Rapid Action Battalion which stormed the cafe, told India’s Times Now television network. © 1994-2016 Agence France-Presse

Bangladesh commandos storm Dhaka hostage cafe

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Heavily armed Bangladeshi commandos stormed a Dhaka restaurant Saturday where suspected Islamist militants were holding dozens of people hostage, including foreigners, after a deadly firefight with police, officials said. “The operation has began. Commandos have stormed the restaurant,” a security official said. An AFP photographer at the scene said he could hear a massive gunfight as security forces launched the rescue operation more than 10 hours after militants seized the hostages. […]