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11am

Bangladesh relaxes curfew after arresting academics



Randeep Ramesh, south Asia correspondent
Friday August 24, 2007
Guardian Unlimited


Local residents attempt to douse a bus set on fire during protests in Dhaka to demand an end to emergency rule
Local residents attempt to douse a bus set on fire during protests in Dhaka that prompted the curfew. Photograph: Pavel Rahman/AP
 


Bangladesh's military-backed government relaxed a curfew today brought in to quell student riots that had rocked the country's campuses after security forces arrested four university professors who were arch-critics of the regime.

The academics were seized in dawn raids and hours later the government announced it was temporarily suspending the curfew.

The rolling back of the emergency measure will see public transport services resume, and means schools, banks, clinics and pharmacies can reopen in the capital Dhaka and five other cities. Lessons at Dhaka university, which teaches 40,000 students, are also likely to restart.



Among those taken in custody were Harun ur-Rashid, dean of Dhaka university's social science faculty, and Anwar Hossain, dean of bioscience and a prominent leader of the university's teachers' association.

"My father and uncle Anwar were picked up by joint security forces at their homes on the university campus. I don't know where they have been taken," Barnali Rashid, daughter of Mr-ur Rashid, told Reuters news agency.

Both the professors had been active in the protests this week, which began after soldiers clashed with students during a football match on the campus of Dhaka University on Monday. Another two lecturers, one with links to the country's leftwing parties, were arrested from their homes in northwestern Bangladesh, where earlier this week violence had claimed the life of one student.

Reports from Dhaka say that life quickly poured back onto the capital's streets after the curfew was eased. Residents rushed to markets, braving heavy rain, to stock up. The government has also asked state and private television channels not to broadcast any news footage that might incite further violence.

Bangladesh has been effectively under army control since January, although officials say new elections will be held by the end of 2008. Students have long been associated with defying authoritarian regimes in Bangladesh, a poor Muslim-majority nation of 140 million. The current administration recently said it would either ban campus politics or prevent undergraduates from working for the country's major parties.




Related special reports
Afghanistan
Terrorism crisis
Pakistan

Useful links
e-mela.com: Khaleda Zia
CIA factbook: Bangladesh




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