Bangladesh court again rejects bail for Hindu leader who led rallies

Commuters on a rickshaw pass by a graffiti illustrating Student Movement of 2024, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, January 1, 2025. (REUTERS)
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Updated 02 January 2025
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Bangladesh court again rejects bail for Hindu leader who led rallies

DHAKA: A court in southeastern Bangladesh on Thursday rejected a plea for bail by a jailed Hindu leader who led large rallies in the Muslim-majority country demanding better security for minority groups.
Krishna Das Prabhu faces charges of sedition after he led huge rallies in the southeastern city of Chattogram. Hindu groups say there have been thousands of attacks against Hindus since early August, when the secular government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was overthrown.
Authorities did not produce Prabhu at the hearing during which Chattogram Metropolitan Sessions Judge Saiful Islam rejected the bail plea, according to Public Prosecutor Mofizul Haque Bhuiyan. Security was tight, with police and soldiers guarding the court.
Apurba Kumar Bhattacharjee, a lawyer representing Prabhu, said they would appeal the decision.
The court rejected an earlier request for bail made while Prabhu did not have lawyers. Lawyers who sought to represent him at that hearing said they were threatened or intimidated, and many of them are facing charges related to the death of a Muslim lawyer when Prabhu was arrested in Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, in November.
For Thursday’s hearing, 11 lawyers traveled from Dhaka, arriving and leaving with a security escort.
Hindu groups and other minority groups in Bangladesh and abroad have criticized the interim government led by Nobel peace laureate Muhammad Yunus for undermining their security. Yunus and his supporters said that reports of attacks on Hindus and other groups since August have been exaggerated.
Prabhu’s arrest came as tensions spiked following reports of the desecration of the Indian flag in Bangladesh, with some burning it and others laying it on the floor for people to step on. Protesters in India responded in kind, attacks on Hindus in Bangladesh.
Prabhu is a spokesman for the Bangladesh Sammilito Sanatan Jagaran Jote group. He was also associated with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, widely known as the Hare Krishna movement.


US ambassador accuses Poland parliament speaker of insulting Trump

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US ambassador accuses Poland parliament speaker of insulting Trump

Tom Rose said the decision was made because of speaker Wlodzimierz Czarzasty’s “outrageous and unprovoked insults” against the US leader
“We will not permit anyone to harm US-Polish relations, nor disrespect (Trump),” Rose wrote on X

WARSAW: The United States embassy will have “no further dealings” with the speaker of the Polish parliament after claims he insulted President Donald Trump, its ambassador said on Thursday.
Tom Rose said the decision was made because of speaker Wlodzimierz Czarzasty’s “outrageous and unprovoked insults” against the US leader.
“We will not permit anyone to harm US-Polish relations, nor disrespect (Trump), who has done so much for Poland and the Polish people,” Rose wrote on X.
Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk responded the same day, writing on X: “Ambassador Rose, allies should respect, not lecture each other.”
“At least this is how we, here in Poland, understand partnership.”
On Monday, Czarzasty criticized a joint US-Israeli proposal to support Donald Trump’s candidacy for the Nobel Peace Prize.
“I will not support the motion for a Nobel Peace Prize for President Trump, because he doesn’t deserve it,” he told journalists.
Czarzasty said that rather than allying itself more closely with Trump’s White House, Poland should “strengthen existing alliances” such as NATO, the United Nations and the World Health Organization.
He criticized Trump’s leadership, including the imposition of tariffs on European countries, threats to annex Greenland, and, most recently, his claims that NATO allies had stayed “a little off the front lines” during the war in Afghanistan.
He accused Trump of “a breach of the politics of principles and values, often a breach of international law.”
After Rose’s reaction, Czarzasty told local news site Onet: “I maintain my position” on the issue of the peace prize.
“I consistently respect the USA as Poland’s key partner,” he added later on X.
“That is why I regretfully accept the statement by Ambassador Tom Rose, but I will not change my position on these fundamental issues for Polish women and men.”
The speaker heads Poland’s New Left party, which is part of Tusk’s pro-European governing coalition, with which the US ambassador said he has “excellent relations.”
It is currently governing under conservative-nationalist President Karol Nawrocki, a vocal Trump supporter.
In late January, Czarzasty, along with several other high-ranking Polish politicians, denounced Trump’s claim that the United States “never needed” NATO allies.
The parliamentary leader called the claims “scandalous” and said they should be “absolutely condemned.”
Forty-three Polish soldiers and one civil servant died as part of the US-led NATO coalition in Afghanistan.