2024-08-05 20:11:42
Bangladesh’s army chief, Waker-Uz-Zaman, said on Monday he would form an interim government after the prime minister resigned and fled the capital amid massive protests.
“We will form an interim government,” Waker said on state television, adding that Sheikh Hasina had resigned.
76 year old Sh. Hasina fled the country by helicopter, a source close to her told AFP shortly after protesters stormed her palace in Dhaka.
“Her security team told her to leave, she didn’t even have time to prepare,” the source said, adding that she first left in a motorcade before being flown out by helicopter, but did not specify her destination.
On Monday morning, celebratory crowds waved flags, some climbed onto a tank in the streets of Dhaka, and hundreds stormed past the official Sh. Gate of Hasina’s residence.
Bangladesh’s Channel 24 broadcast images of crowds running into the compound and waving to the camera.
Some time earlier sources reported that Sh. Hasina left the palace for a “safer place” on Monday.
At the same time, mass protests continued in the streets of the capital, Dhaka, demanding her resignation, and waiting for the army chief to address the nation.
Sh. Hasina’s son has called on the country’s security forces to prevent any takeover from her, and a senior adviser told AFP when asked if she would step down that there was a “possibility”.
Bangladeshi army chief Waker-Uz-Zaman will address the nation on Monday afternoon, an army spokesman told AFP without giving further details.
“Uphold the Constitution”
Rallies against recruitment quotas for civil servants, which began last month, have turned into some of the biggest unrest in the 15-year-old Sh. Hasina’s rule and escalated into wider calls for the 76-year-old prime minister to step down.
“Your duty is to ensure the safety of our people and country and uphold the constitution,” her son, Sajeeb Wazed Joy, who lives in the US, wrote on Facebook. “This means that no unelected government can be allowed to come to power for a single minute, it is your duty.”
But protesters defied security forces who imposed a curfew on Monday and marched through the capital’s streets a day after the deadliest unrest since demonstrations began last month.
Internet access was severely restricted on Monday, offices were closed and more than 3,500 factories operating in Bangladesh’s economy-vital garment industry were closed.
Soldiers and police with armored personnel carriers barbed wire in Dhaka had barricaded the roads to Sh. Hasina’s office, AFP reporters said, but huge crowds flooded the streets and tore down barricades.
The Business Standard newspaper estimated there were up to 400,000 protesters on the streets, but this number could not be verified.
“The time has come for the final protest,” said Asif Mahmud, one of the main leaders of the nationwide civil disobedience campaign.
“Shocking Violence”
At least 94 people were killed on Sunday, including 14 police officers.
Protesters and government supporters fought across the country armed with clubs and knives, and security forces opened fire.
A total of at least 300 people have been killed since the protests began in July, AFP reported, citing figures from police, government officials and hospital doctors.
“The shocking violence in Bangladesh must stop,” UN human rights chief Volker Turk said in a statement.
“This is an unprecedented popular uprising by any standard,” said Ali Riaz, a politics professor at Illinois State University and an expert on Bangladesh. “Also, the cruelty of state actors and persons loyal to the regime has no analogues in history.”
In Dhaka on Sunday, protesters climbed on Sh. Statues of Hasina’s father, the country’s independence leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and beating her with hammers were seen in social media videos verified by AFP.
2024-08-05 20:11:42