BNP activist dies of bomb injuries

One BNP activist was killed yesterday on the first day of a two-day general shutdown called by the BNP-led opposition alliance. Thirty-year-old Munir was hit by a bomb hurled by striking opposition activists while a procession was being taken out by the Jatiyabadi Chhatra Dal, the BNP's student wing, in old Dhaka's Lalbagh area. The man was taken to hospital with shrapnel injuries but succumbed later. The two-day strike was called to protest the killing of four people, including a policeman, during Tuesday's countrywide strike in the capital.

On that day, three people were killed when ruling Awami League party activists fired on a BNP procession and a police constable was killed in the police barracks, allegedly shot by BNP activists. Yesterday, sporadic clashes in other parts of the city left 10 people injured. Police used water cannons and fired tear gas shells to quell unruly pickets who stoned vehicles and went on the rampage.

Witnesses and police said elements enforcing a shut down torched or damaged at least a dozen cycle-rickshaws and auto-rickshaws in the capital, especially in the southern part. They burnt a motorcycle in the capital's Naya Paltan area as well. On Jagannath Shaha Road in the old part of the city, police and pickets chased each other while Bijoynagar, Nayapaltan, Shantinagar, Shahjahanpur were under the grips of shutdown activists.


Pro-shutdown elements took out several processions from different parts of the city in the morning. Government supporters also took out processions against the recurring shutdown in different areas of the city. Despite the general ruckus, cycle-rickshaws, auto-rickshaws and tempos plied as usual. Some mini-buses and Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation coaches were also seen plying different routes in the city.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, at a public rally in northern Natore town on Tuesday, urged opposition leader Khaleda Zia to quit the politics of strikes and destruction and take part in the elections under a non-party caretaker government. The elections are due in October this year.The BNP, on the other hand, at a rally in the city yesterday called on all to take a fresh vow to remain on the streets till the Awami League government is brought to its knees.