DHAKA: Thousands of students across Bangladesh staged protests and sit-ins Monday after clashes at the country’s top university left at least 100 people injured.
Police fired rubber bullets and tear gas at Dhaka University students fighting what they complain are discriminatory quotas for government jobs in favor of special groups.
It was one of the biggest protests faced by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in her decade in power, and the government agreed later on Monday to review the quota system.
Following the violence that erupted Sunday and continued into the early hours of Monday, classes at Dhaka University ground to a halt as thousands occupied the main square chanting “Reform, reform!“
Protests spread with students at state-run universities in Chittagong, Khulna, Rajshahi, Barisal, Rangpur, Sylhet and Savar boycotting classes and staging sit-ins, police and media said.
At Jahangirnagar University in Savar, where more than 1,000 students demonstrated, protests turned violent with more than 30 injured in clashes with police.
Fifteen students remained in hospital for treatment, said Zahidur Rahmab, a spokesman for Enam Medical College Hospital in Savar.
The students are angry at the government’s decision to set aside 56 percent of civil service jobs for the families of veterans from the 1971 war of independence and for disadvantaged minorities.
That leaves most university graduates to fight for only 44 percent of the jobs.
Dhaka University students said they would continue their fight.
“We won’t leave the streets unless our demands are met. This is all about dignity. We are not afraid of bullets,” said Abdullah Bhuiyan, a 22-year-old English student.
Another student, Saimon Rahman, said quotas meant young graduates missed out on government jobs: “We want a merit-based society. We want equal opportunities for all,” he said.
Students burned furniture and set lengths of bamboo alight but no fresh clashes were reported after the overnight scuffles turned Dhaka University into a battleground.
Hundreds of police patrolled key entry points to the campus.
Organizers in Dhaka said they had been holding peaceful protests Sunday when police started firing tear gas and rubber bullets, and used batons and water cannon to clear a central square.
As violence spread across the campus, thousands of male and female students engaged in pitched battles with officers.
“More than 100 people were injured,” police inspector Bacchu Mia told AFP, adding they were treated in hospital but their condition was not serious.
Protesters threw rocks, vandalized the home of the Dhaka University vice-chancellor, torched two cars and ransacked the fine arts institute, said senior police officer Azimul Haque.
Fifteen people were detained, police said.
Hasina ordered the job quota system be reviewed after meeting with her cabinet Monday, said senior minister Obaidul Quader.
“The government does not have a rigid stance on this (issue),” Quader said.
Hasan Al Mamun, leader of the student group behind the demonstrations, told AFP they had postponed further protest action for the month in the wake of the government’s decision.
He earlier said tens of thousands of students joined the protests nationwide Monday. Police declined to estimate the number.
Al Mamun said the quota for top-grade jobs should be reduced to 10 percent.
“These quotas are discriminatory. Due to the quota system, 56 percent of the jobs are set aside for five percent of the country’s population. And 95 percent of the people can compete for the 44 percent,” he said.
Students are particularly upset at the 30-percent quota set aside for descendants of veterans of the independence war.
Sheikh Hasina, whose father was the architect of the country’s independence from Pakistan, has in the past rejected demands to slash the quotas.
Thousands rally in Bangladesh after 100 injured in student protest
Thousands rally in Bangladesh after 100 injured in student protest
- Dhaka University students fighting what they complain are discriminatory quotas for government jobs
- 30 injuries at Jahangirnagar University in Savar
Ukraine’s air defense units trying to repel Russian drone attack on Kyiv, Ukraine’s military says
KYIV: Ukraine’s air defense systems were engaged on the outskirts of Kyiv in trying to repel a Russian drone attack, the military administration of the Ukrainian capital said on Wednesday on the Telegram messaging app.
Reuters witnesses said they heard several blasts in what sounded like air defense units in operation.
Trump says will meet India’s Modi during US visit
Flint, US: Former US president Donald Trump said Tuesday he plans to meet next week with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will be visiting the United States for several official events.
During a campaign event in Michigan, Trump slammed India as a “very big abuser” on trade, but said Modi was “fantastic.”
“He happens to be coming to meet me next week,” Trump told the crowd without providing further details.
Modi will be traveling this weekend to Wilmington, Delaware — President Joe Biden’s hometown — as part of the “Quad Leaders” summit alongside Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio.
The four-way Quad grouping dates back to 2007, but Biden has strongly pushed the alliance as part of an emphasis on international alliances to rein in adversaries — especially China.
The upcoming summit marks Biden’s last with the group as US president, having abandoned his bid for another White House term, with Vice President Kamala Harris replacing him at the top of the Democratic ticket.
After the summit, Modi will attend the United nations General Assembly in New York, as well as a meeting with Indian community members.
Despite no longer being president, Trump met in Florida in July with Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a close ally who is hoping the Republican reclaims the White House in November.
Portugal battles ferocious wildfires as toll rises to seven
AGUEDA, Portugal: Thousands of firefighters on Tuesday battled wildfires in Portugal that have killed seven people and burnt more land in a matter of days than the rest of the summer combined.
Fanned by bellowing winds in the stifling heat, the three largest fires concentrated in the northern Aveiro region scorched some 10,000 hectares (24,700 acres) by Monday evening, according to a civil protection report.
Three firefighters died on Tuesday when their vehicle was trapped by the flames, civil protection authorities said, bringing the fire-related toll up to seven, with some 50 injured.
The two women and a man were killed while fighting flames in the central region of Coimbra, the interior ministry said. The trio was previously reported to have been killed in the north.
Across the Iberian nation, more than 4,500 firefighters, more than 1,000 vehicles and around 20 aircraft on Tuesday were battling some 50 fires in all, with an alert warning in force since Saturday afternoon extended until Thursday evening.
“We’re in for some very difficult times over the next few days,” Portugal’s Prime Minister Luis Montenegro — who canceled all his Tuesday engagements in response to the blaze — warned on Monday evening.
“Nobody is sleeping here, we’ve been up since two o’clock in the morning,” Maria Ludivina Castanheira, 63, said in the village of Arrancada, south of the coastal city of Porto, where villagers hurried to a small warehouse to fight a fire there.
“We opened the cages so that the pigeons could escape” and “we moved the chickens to a neighbor’s,” Antonia Estima, 39, said as she took a break from helping to fight the flames.
Portuguese authorities have invoked the European Union’s civil protection mechanism to obtain eight additional firefighting aircraft.
Following the two Canadair water bombers sent from Spain on Monday, aircraft made available by France, Italy and Greece were also expected to arrive.
In the municipality of Albergaria-a-Velha, a 28-year-old Brazilian employed by a forestry company died after he became trapped by the flames as he tried to collect some tools.
Another person suffered a heart attack on Monday, while on Sunday a volunteer firefighter died suddenly while taking a lunch break from battling a blaze near Oliveira de Azemeis in hard-hit Aveiro.
Raging since the weekend before worsening on Monday, the blazes have also left around 50 people injured, including 33 firefighters, according to the latest figures from the authorities.
Several roads are still cut off in the northern Portuguese districts of Aveiro, Viseu, Vila Real, Braga and Porto as well as in the central Coimbra region.
Monday saw the highest fire-risk weather conditions in the northern half of the country since 2001, according to experts interviewed by the weekly Expresso.
Scientists say that fossil fuel emissions are worsening the length, frequency and intensity of heatwaves across the world.
The rising temperatures are leading to longer wildfire seasons and increasing the area burnt in the flames, according to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Air France suspends services to Beirut and Tel Aviv
Air France is suspending services from the French capital’s Charles de Gaulle airport to Beirut and Tel Aviv up to and including Sept. 19 due to escalating security concerns in the Middle East, the airline said on Tuesday.
The operations will resume following an assessment of the situation, Air France added.
Earlier in the day, Lufthansa Group said it is suspending all connections to and from Tel Aviv and Tehran and will bypass Israeli and Iranian airspace up to and including Sept. 19.
US senator accuses Muslim advocate of supporting extremism in hearing on hate
- “This harassment is alarming,” Muslim American advocacy group Engage Action said
WASHINGTON: Republican US Senator John Kennedy accused a leading Muslim civil rights advocate of supporting extremism during a Senate hearing on hate incidents in the US, drawing criticism from many rights groups.
“You support Hamas, do you not?” Kennedy told Arab American Institute Executive Director Maya Berry, who replied by saying: “You asking the executive director of the Arab American Institute that question very much puts the focus on the issue of hate in our country.”
In a follow-up question, the senator asked, “You support Hezbollah, too, don’t you?” He later told her, “You should hide your head in a bag.”
Berry repeatedly said in her responses that she did not support those groups, and added that she found the line of questioning “extraordinarily disappointing.”
Islamist militant groups Hamas, which carried out a deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israel, and Hezbollah are both designated as “foreign terrorist organizations” by the US government.
Multiple rights advocates denounced Senator Kennedy.
“It is absolutely reprehensible that a US senator would weaponize the racial identity of a witness and accuse her of supporting terrorism by using an anti-Arab and anti-Muslim trope in a hearing meant to tackle precisely that kind of bigotry,” Council on American Islamic Relations Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw told Reuters.
“This harassment is alarming,” Muslim American advocacy group Engage Action said.
The Democratic-led Senate Judiciary Committee, which organized Tuesday’s hearing, also condemned the senator and called Berry’s response to him “powerful.”
Rights advocates have warned about rising threats against American Muslims, Arabs and Jews since the eruption of Israel’s war in Gaza following Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
US incidents in recent months include the attempted drowning of a 3-year-old Muslim girl in Texas, the fatal stabbing of a 6-year-old Muslim boy in Illinois, the stabbing of a Muslim man in Texas, the beating of a Muslim man in New York, threats of violence against Jews at Cornell University that led to a conviction and sentencing, and an unsuccessful plot to attack a New York City Jewish center.
