DHAKA: Student leaders rallied Bangladeshis on Saturday for a nationwide civil disobedience campaign as Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government weathered a worsening backlash over a deadly police crackdown on protesters.
Rallies against civil service job quotas sparked days of mayhem last month that killed more than 200 people in some of the worst unrest of Hasina’s 15-year tenure.
Troop deployments briefly restored order but crowds hit the streets in huge numbers after Friday prayers in the Muslim-majority nation, heeding a call by student leaders to press the government for more concessions.
Students Against Discrimination, the group responsible for organizing the initial protests, urged their compatriots to launch an all-out non-cooperation movement from Sunday.
“This includes non-payment of taxes and utility bills, strikes by government workers and a halt to overseas remittance payments through banks,” the group’s Asif Mahmud told AFP.
Mahmud’s fellow student leaders also said another round of nationwide rallies would be staged on Saturday.
“Please don’t stay at home. Join your nearest protest march,” Mahmud wrote on Facebook.
Students are demanding a public apology from Hasina for last month’s violence and the dismissal of several of her ministers.
They have also insisted that the government reopens schools and universities around the country, all of which were shuttered at the height of the unrest.
Crowds on the street have gone further, chanting demands for Hasina to leave office.
Hasina, 76, has ruled Bangladesh since 2009 and won her fourth consecutive election in January after a vote without genuine opposition.
Her government is accused by rights groups of misusing state institutions to entrench its hold on power and stamp out dissent, including the extrajudicial killing of opposition activists.
Demonstrations began in early July over the reintroduction of a quota scheme — since scaled back by Bangladesh’s top court — that reserved more than half of all government jobs for certain groups.
With around 18 million young Bangladeshis out of work, according to government figures, the move upset graduates facing an acute employment crisis.
The protests had remained largely peaceful until attacks on demonstrators by police and pro-government student groups.
Hasina’s government eventually imposed a nationwide curfew, deployed troops and shut down the nation’s mobile Internet network for 11 days to restore order.
Foreign governments condemned the clampdown, with European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell this week calling for an international probe into the “excessive and lethal force against protesters.”
Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan told reporters last weekend that security forces had operated with restraint but were “forced to open fire” to defend government buildings.
At least 32 children were among those killed last month, the UN said Friday.
Bangladesh students call for nationwide civil disobedience
https://arab.news/gaevb
Bangladesh students call for nationwide civil disobedience
- Rallies against civil service job quotas sparked days of mayhem last month that killed over 200 in some of the worst unrest of PM Hasina’s tenure
- Troop deployments briefly restored order but crowds hit the streets in huge numbers after Friday prayers in the Muslim-majority nation
Germany expands border controls to curb migrant arrivals
Berlin announced the sweeping measure following a string of deadly extremist attacks that have stoked public fears and boosted support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
Interior Minister Nancy Faeser on Sunday said that the step aimed to limit irregular migration and “put a stop to criminals and identify and stop Islamists at an early stage.”
The border controls will be in place for an initial six months and are expected to include temporary structures at land crossings and spot checks by federal police.
Poland and Austria have voiced concern and the European Commission has warned that members of the 27-nation bloc must only impose such steps in exceptional circumstances.
Germany lies at the heart of Europe and borders nine countries that are part of the visa-free Schengen zone, designed to allow the free movement of people and goods.
Border controls with Poland, the Czech Republic, Austria and Switzerland were already in place before the crackdown was announced.
These will now be expanded to Germany’s borders with France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark.
Faeser said the government hoped to minimize the impact on people living and working in border regions, promising “coordination with our neighboring countries.”
The interior ministry however noted that travelers should carry identification when crossing the border.
In recent weeks, a string of extremist attacks have shocked Germany, fueling rising public anger.
Last month, a man on a knife rampage killed three people and wounded eight more at a festival in the western city of Solingen.
The Syrian suspect, who has alleged links to the Daesh group, had been intended for deportation but managed to evade authorities.
The enforcement failure set off a bitter debate which marked the run-up to two regional polls in the formerly communist east, where the anti-immigration AfD scored unprecedented results.
With national elections looming next year, Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government has been under intense political pressure to toughen its stance on migrants and asylum seekers.
Scholz was in Uzbekistan on Sunday to sign a migration deal for workers to come to Germany, while simplifying deportation procedures in the opposite direction so that “those that must go back do go back,” the chancellor said.
Closer to home, the German government has presented plans to speed up deportations to European partners.
Under EU rules, asylum requests are meant to be handled by the country of arrival. The system has placed a huge strain on countries on the European periphery, where leaders have demanded more burden-sharing.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said that Germany tightening its borders means that it would “essentially pass the buck to countries located on the outer borders of Europe.”
Austria’s Interior Minister Gerhard Karner said his country “will not accept people who are rejected from Germany,” while Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk condemned Germany’s move as “unacceptable.”
Warsaw has also struggled with migration and accused Moscow of smuggling people from Africa and the Middle East into Europe by sending them through Belarus to the Polish border.
Berlin on Friday said that Tusk and Scholz had discussed the issue and agreed to strengthen EU external borders, “especially in view of the cynical instrumentalization of migrants by Belarus.”
Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban, meanwhile, mocked the German chancellor on social media site X, writing: “Bundeskanzler Scholz, welcome to the club! #StopMigration.”
Germany took in more than a million asylum seekers in 2015-16, many of them Syrians, and has hosted over a million Ukrainians since the start of the Russian invasion in 2022.
The extra burden on municipal authorities and integration services in Germany needed to be “taken into account” when talking about new border controls, Berlin’s interior ministry said.
In the Netherlands, Prime Minister Dick Schoof on Friday unveiled the country’s strictest migration policy yet, saying it will request an opt-out from EU common policy on asylum next week.
A four-party coalition dominated by far-right firebrand Geert Wilders’s Freedom Party wants to declare an “asylum crisis” to curb the influx of migrants through a tough set of rules including border controls.
Pakistan court grants bail to 10 MPs linked to jailed ex-PM Imran Khan
ISLAMABAD: An anti-terrorism court in Pakistan granted bail Monday to 10 lawmakers from jailed former prime minister Imran Khan’s party, an AFP journalist witnessed.
At least 30 people from Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party — including the 10 MPs — were remanded in custody last Tuesday, two days after they led a major rally in the capital, Islamabad.
The anti-terrorism court granted them bail of 30,000 rupees ($100).
PTI has faced a sweeping crackdown since Khan was jailed in August last year on a series of charges he says are politically motivated and designed to keep him from power.
The 10 MPs, some detained at their offices in the National Assembly, were charged under a new protest law and the anti-terrorism act.
They were accused of violating the Peaceful Assembly and Public Order Act, passed just days before the rally was held, in a move rights groups say was an attempt to curb freedom of expression and peaceful protest.
PTI has sparred with the military since Khan was deposed two years ago.
The confrontation came to a head after the former cricket star’s first arrest on corruption charges in May 2023.
His supporters waged days of sometimes violent protests and attacked military installations, sparking a sweeping crackdown on PTI led by the army — Pakistan’s most powerful institution.
But the clampdown failed to diminish Khan’s popularity and candidates backed by the former premier won the most seats in 2024 polls — marred by allegations of widespread rigging.
Khan rose to power in 2018 with the help of the military, analysts say, but was ousted in 2022 after reportedly falling out with the generals.
A United Nations panel of experts found this month that his detention “had no legal basis and appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office.”
A number of convictions against him have been overturned by the courts.
Several members of the PTI’s social media and press team were rounded up last month and accused of “anti-state propaganda.”
Police operation under way after explosion in Cologne, Bild reports
BERLIN: A police operation is under way after an explosion in central Cologne, the Bild newspaper reported on Monday.
Local police posted on the social media platform X that a police operation was under way on the Hohenzollernring ring road and that residents should avoid the area.
Starmer and Meloni holding talks on curbing migrant boats reaching UK and Italy
- The center-left Labour Party prime minister is not a natural ally of Meloni, who heads the far-right Brothers of Italy party
ROME: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is meeting Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni in Rome on Monday, as the two very different politicians, from left and right, seek common cause to curb migrants reaching their shores by boat. The visit comes after at least eight seaborne migrants died off the French coast on the weekend.
Support for Ukraine is also on the agenda for the trip, part of Starmer’s effort to reset relations with European neighbors after Britain’s acrimonious 2020 departure from the European Union.
The center-left Labour Party prime minister isn’t a natural ally of Meloni, who heads the far-right Brothers of Italy party. But migration has climbed the UK political agenda, and Starmer hopes Italy’s tough approach can help him stop people fleeing war and poverty trying to cross the English Channel in flimsy, overcrowded boats.
More than 22,000 migrants have made the perilous crossing from France so far this year, a slight increase compared to the same period in 2023. Several dozen people have perished in attempt, including the eight killed when a boat carrying some 60 people ran aground on rocks late Saturday.
Starmer promised “a new era of international enforcement to dismantle these networks, protect our shores and bring order to the asylum system.”
“No more gimmicks,” he said before his trip to Rome — a reference to the previous Conservative government’s scuttled plan to send some asylum-seekers on a one-way trip to Rwanda.
Meloni pledged a crackdown on migration after taking office in 2022, aiming to deter would-be refugees from paying smugglers to make the dangerous Mediterranean crossing to Italy. Her nationalist conservative government has signed deals with individual African countries to block departures, imposed limits on the work of humanitarian rescue ships, cracked down on traffickers and taken measures to deter people from setting off.
Italy also has signed a deal with Albania under which some adult male migrants rescued at sea while trying to reach Italy would be taken instead to Albania while their asylum claims are processed.
The number of migrants arriving in Italy by boat in the first half of this year was down 60 percent from 2023, according to the country’s Interior Ministry.
Starmer wants to learn from Italy’s mix of tough enforcement and international cooperation, though Italy’s approach has been criticized by refugee groups and others alarmed by Europe’s increasingly strict asylum rules, growing xenophobia and hostile treatment of migrants.
The leader of Italy’s right-wing League, Matteo Salvin i, who is deputy prime minister in Meloni’s government, has been accused by prosecutors of alleged kidnapping for for his decision to prevent a rescue ship carrying more than 100 migrants from landing in Italy when he was interior minister in 2019.
Starmer will tour Italy’s national immigration crime coordination center with newly appointed UK Border Security Commander Martin Hewitt. The government says Hewitt, a former head of Britain’s National Police Chiefs’ Council, will work with law enforcement and intelligence agencies in the UK and across Europe to tackle-people smuggling networks.
Soon after being elected in July, Starmer scrapped the Conservatives’ contentious plan to send asylum-seekers who cross the Channel to Rwanda, about 4,000 miles (6,400 kilometers) away, with no chance of returning to the UK even if their refugee claims were successful.
The Conservatives said the deportation plan would act as a deterrent, but refugee and human rights groups called it unethical, judges ruled it illegal and Starmer dismissed it as an expensive gimmick. He has, though, expressed an interest in striking agreements like the one Italy has with Albania that would see asylum-seekers sent temporarily to another country.
The Rome trip follows visits to Paris, Berlin and Dublin during Starmer’s first weeks in office — all part of efforts to restore ties with EU neighbors that have been frayed by Brexit. Starmer has ruled out rejoining the now 27-nation bloc, but is keen for a closer relationship on security and other issues.
Ukraine will also feature in his talks with the Italian government, which holds the presidency of the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations this year.
Unlike some politicians on the European right, Meloni is a staunch supporter of Ukraine. Starmer meets her after returning from Washington, where he and US President Joe Biden discussed Ukraine’s plea to use Western-supplied missiles to strike targets deep inside Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been pressing allies to allow his forces to use Western weapons to target air bases and launch sites inside Russia as Moscow steps up assaults on Ukraine’s electricity grid and utilities before winter. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that would mean NATO countries “are at war with Russia.”
So far, the US hasn’t announced a change to its policy of allowing Kyiv to use American-provided weapons only in a limited area inside Russia’s border with Ukraine.
Indian police detain 100 Samsung workers, union leaders
NEW DELHI: Indian police have detained around 100 striking workers and union leaders protesting low wages at a Samsung Electronics plant in southern India, as they were planning a march on Monday without permission, police officials said.
The detention marks an escalation of a strike by workers at a Samsung home appliance plant near Chennai city in the state of Tamil Nadu. Workers want higher wages and have boycotted work for seven days, disrupting production that contributes roughly a third of Samsung’s annual India revenue of $12 billion.
A senior police official of Kancheepuram district, Sankar Ganesh, told Reuters by telephone that around 100 workers were under “preventive arrest,” without elaborating.
