By JULHAS ALAM
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — A new round of violence in Bangladesh has left more than 30 people dead and hundreds injured as protesters clashed with police and ruling party activists on Sunday, officials and media reports said.
As the violence raged, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said those who were engaging in the “sabotage” and the destruction in the name of protests were no longer students, but criminals, and said the people should deal with them with iron hands.
Demonstrators are demanding Hasina’s resignation, after earlier protests in July that began with students calling for an end to a quota system for government jobs escalated into violence that left more than 200 dead.
Also Sunday, the government announced a holiday from Monday to Wednesday. Courts will remain closed for an indefinite period. Mobile internet service was off on Sunday, while Facebook and messaging apps including WhatsApp were inaccessible even on broadband internet.
Junior Minister for Information and Broadcasting Mohammad Ali Arafat said Sunday that mobile internet and messaging services were off to help prevent violence.
Authorities in response closed schools and universities across the country, blocked internet access and imposed a shoot-on-sight curfew. At least 11,000 people have been arrested in recent weeks.
Protesters called for a “non-cooperation” effort, urging people not to pay taxes and utility bills and not show up for work on Sunday, a working day in Bangladesh. Offices, banks and factories opened, but commuters in Dhaka and other cities faced challenges getting to work.
The protesters attacked Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University, a major public hospital in Dhaka’s Shahbagh area, torching several vehicles.
Video footage showed the protesters vandalizing a prison van in Dhaka’s chief metropolitan magistrate’s court. Other videos showed police clashing with the protesters by opening fire, teargas and rubber bullets. The protesters set fire to vehicles, the ruling party’s offices. Some carried sharp weapons, sticks, according to TV stations’ footage.
In Dhaka’s Uttara neighborhood, police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of people who blocked a major highway. Protesters attacked homes and vandalized a community welfare office in the area, where hundreds of ruling party activists took up positions. Some crude bombs were detonated and gunshots were heard, witnesses said. At east 20 people were hit by bullets in the area.
Most of the deaths happened in the district of Feni in southeast Bangladesh, where at least five people died as Hasina’s supporters clashed with protesters.
Asif Iqbal, a resident medical officer at a state-run hospital in Feni, told reporters that they had five bodies at the hospital and all of them were hit by bullets. It was not clear if they were protesters or ruling party activists.
In Munshiganj district near Dhaka, hospital official Abu Hena said four people were declared dead after being rushed to a hospital with injuries.
Jamuna TV station reported another 24 deaths across more than a dozen districts including in Bogura, Magura, Rangpur and Sirajganj districts, where the protesters backed by the country’s main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party clashed with police and the activists of the ruling Awami League party and its associated bodies.
The country’s leading Bengali-language daily, Prothom Alo, said 32 people died in Sunday’s violence. Channel 24 TV station reported at least 30 deaths.
The protests began last month as students demanded an end to a quota system that reserved 30% of government jobs for the families of veterans who fought in Bangladesh’s war of independence against Pakistan in 1971. As violence crested, the country’s Supreme Court scaled back the quota system to 5% of jobs, with 3% for relatives of veterans, but protests have continued demanding accountability for violence the demonstrators blame on the government’s use of excessive force.
The quota system also includes quotas members of ethnic minorities, and disabled and transgender people, which were cut from 26% to 2% in the ruling.
Hasina’s administration has blamed the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party and now-banned right-wing Jamaat-e-Islami party and their student wings for instigating violence, in which several state-owned establishments were also torched or vandalized.
Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, secretary-general of the main opposition party, repeated a call for the government to step down to stop the chaos.
Hasina offered to talk with student leaders on Saturday, but a coordinator refused and announced a one-point demand for her resignation.
Hasina repeated her pledges to thoroughly investigate the deaths and punish those responsible for the violence. She said that her doors were open for talks and she was ready to sit down whenever the protesters want.
The protests have become a major challenge for Hasina, who has ruled the country for over 15 years, returning to power for a fourth consecutive term in January in an election that was boycotted by her main opponents.
