Bangladesh's opposition members nabbed for alleged violence planning

Source:Xinhua Published: 2014-10-26 9:16:02

Scores of activists of ex-Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) were arrested on Saturday morning in capital Dhaka for suspected violence planning.

"63 BNP men along with Moazzem Hossain Alal who is president of Jubo Dal (BNP's youth wing) have been arrested," said a senior official of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP).

The official who preferred to be unnamed said BNP men have been arrested from the basement of a building in the city while they were holding a meeting for plans to create trouble during Sunday's strike.

"We've received information from our sources that the meeting was meant to plan for staging violent activities during Sunday's strike of a coalition of several Islamist parities," said the official.

BNP spokesman Rizvi Ahmed has denied the allegation, saying BNP has no connection with Sunday's strike.

"We've not even extended our party's support to the strike."

A coalition of several Islamist parties in Bangladesh has called the nationwide dawn-to-dusk strike for Sunday as their demand to arrest a sacked minister remained unfulfilled.

Leaders of the coalition at a press conference in Dhaka on Wednesday evening made the announcement.

Bangladeshi Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology Minister Abdul Latif Siddique was removed on Oct. 16 from the cabinet for his derogatory comments on annual Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's son Sajeeb Wazed Joy, Tablighi Jamaat (an Islmic religious movement) and expatiate Bangladeshis in New York.


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