BHABANIPUR, Bangladesh: A giant portrait of Bangladesh’s founding leader made from rice paddies has drawn hundreds of visitors as the country gears up to celebrate its 50th anniversary of independence this month.
The 400 meter-long portrait of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman — the father of Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina — was created from planting purple and green rice over the 13 hectares (33 acres) of land.
Sheikh Mujib, as he is known, was born a century ago, and was a central figure in Bangladesh’s war for independence from Pakistan that ended 50 years ago. He became the country’s first leader but was assassinated during a military coup in 1975.
Last year, the prime minister unveiled plans for mass celebrations to mark the centenary birthday of Sheikh Mujib and 50 years since the founding of Bangladesh.
Since then, hundreds of sculptures and murals of Sheikh Mujib have been appearing across the country.
“People come from all over the country. Since the portrait became visible last month, every day we have got hundreds of visitors,” Mohammad Asaduzzaman, a manager of National AgriCare, the company behind the giant portrait, told AFP.
The firm imported Chinese purple seeds to add to the local green variety and recruited fine arts students, hundreds of volunteers and rural workers to make the portrait.
“He is our father of the nation. We got independence thanks to him,” Shrimoti Mayrani Robidas, one of the workers, told AFP.
“It felt so good when we planted the rice which became his ear, his nose and face. We heard he loved farmers. He is like life and death to us.”
Although the commemorations have been overshadowed by the coronavirus pandemic, the government has embarked on a mass building of murals and memorials to honor Sheikh Mujib.
This month, visits from the leaders of India, the Maldives and Nepal will kickstart the main celebration events.
But religious hard-liners have expressed anger at a planned new sculpture of Sheikh Mujib on a main road in central Dhaka, warning they will pull it down.
Islam forbids all forms of idolatry and hard-liners have in the past opposed statues and sculptures in public places.
The latest threat has prompted police to increase security around more than 1,220 murals and monuments to the former leader, many of them put up during the incumbent prime minister’s last 12 years in power.
A police official told AFP that 24-hour security had been posted at two murals of Sheikh Mujib at a major bridge at Tangail, northwest of Dhaka.
Giant portrait of Bangladesh’s founder heightens anniversary fervor
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Giant portrait of Bangladesh’s founder heightens anniversary fervor
- The portrait of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was created from planting purple and green rice over 13 hectares of land
- Sheikh Mujib was a central figure in Bangladesh’s war for independence from Pakistan that ended 50 years ago
Hajj operations set ‘global benchmark’ in crowd management: Sri Lanka envoy
- Almost 1.7m people undertook Hajj pilgrimage this year
- Saudi authorities used AI systems to manage pilgrim flow
COLOMBO: Saudi Arabia’s organization of this year’s Hajj has set a new standard in crowd management through the use of advanced technologies, Sri Lanka’s envoy said on Sunday, as hundreds of thousands of pilgrims started to return home.
In the 2025 Hajj season, almost 1.7 million people undertook the spiritual journey that is one of the tenets of Islam. More than 1.5 million arrived in the Kingdom from abroad, according to data from the General Authority for Statistics.
Pilgrims started to arrive in May, ahead of the main rituals which this year fell on June 6-10. Many have already departed for their countries of origin but special post-Hajj flights will continue to operate until mid-July.
The way the temporary influx of people has been handled by the Kingdom has “set a global benchmark in crowd management and smart innovation,” said Ameer Ajwad, Sri Lanka’s ambassador to the Kingdom, who this year was part of his country’s Hajj contingent.
Technology has played a key role in monitoring footage from more than 15,000 cameras installed in and around the holy city of Makkah.
The monitoring systems were designed to detect unusual crowd movements and anticipate bottlenecks in foot traffic to help prevent stampedes.
“The Kingdom set an exemplary global benchmark for crowd management by using AI-based crowd monitoring, predictive analytics as well as preventing unauthorized entries,” Ajwad told Arab News.
“Innovations by using advanced technologies such smart tents, digital tools and AI systems were also introduced to facilitate this year’s Hajj arrangements.”
More than 420,000 workers from the public and private sectors, including security services, served pilgrims during this year’s Hajj, GASTAT data shows.
The envoy highlighted the “tireless services rendered by the Saudi security and military officers, as well as guides and volunteers,” and extended gratitude to the Ministry of Health for “providing world-class healthcare services to the Hajj pilgrims (from) around the globe, including heart surgery for a Sri Lankan pilgrim.”
About 3,500 Sri Lankans took part in the pilgrimage this year. Muslims constitute about 10 percent of the 22 million population of the island nation, which is predominantly Buddhist.
Greenland is a European territory, says French foreign minister
PARIS: Greenland is a European territory and it is normal that Europe and France show their interest, French Foreign Minister Jean Noel Barrot told RTL radio on Sunday when asked about French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to the Arctic island.
Macron visits Greenland on Sunday, in a show of solidarity with Denmark that is meant to send a signal of European resolve after US President Donald Trump threatened to take over the island.
Russia has handed Ukraine another 1,200 bodies of war dead – news agencies
- Russia says it has so far handed Ukraine the bodies of nearly 5,000 Ukrainian service personnel
- Ukraine and Russia have conducted three exchanges of POWs so far, but have not disclosed exact numbers
MOSCOW: Russia on Sunday handed Ukraine another 1,200 bodies of Ukrainian soldiers killed in the war, Russian state news agencies reported on Sunday, saying Moscow had not received a single Russian corpse in return.
Russian state news agencies TASS and RIA both reported the handover, citing an unnamed source.
It is the fourth in a series of handovers of soldiers’ remains to take place in the past week, in accordance with an agreement reached between Russia and Ukraine at talks in Istanbul earlier this month.
Kyiv and Moscow agreed to each hand over as many as 6,000 bodies and to exchange sick and heavily wounded prisoners of war and those aged under 25.
Russia says it has so far handed Ukraine the bodies of nearly 5,000 Ukrainian service personnel, but has only reported receiving a total of 27 Russian servicemen in return.
Ukraine and Russia have conducted three exchanges of POWs so far, but have not disclosed exact numbers.
1 killed and 19 injured as a hot air balloon crashes in central Turkiye
ISTANBUL: A hot air balloon crashed in central Turkiye on Sunday, leaving its pilot dead and 19 Indonesian tourists injured, a local official said.
In a statement, the governor’s office said the balloon was affected by a sudden change of wind.
It was trying to make a hard landing near the village of Gozlukuyu in Aksaray province, when the pilot fell out of the balloon’s basket and his feet got tangled in a rope, Aksaray Governor Mehmet Ali Kumbuzoglu said.
“Unfortunately, our pilot got stuck under the basket and died,” he said, adding that the injured tourists were taken to a hospital.
Hot air ballooning is a popular tourist activity over the rugged landscape of central Turkiye, which is dotted with ancient churches hewn into cliff faces. The attractions include the “fairy chimneys” of Cappadocia — the tall, cone-shaped rock formations created by natural erosion over thousands of years that are a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Video from Ilhas News Agency showed one deflated balloon, its passenger basket lying on its side, as emergency services tended to injured people. An investigation is underway.
State-run Anadolu Agency said another hot air balloon taking off from the same location of Ilhara Valley also made a hard landing early Sunday morning, and that 12 Indian tourists were slightly injured and taken to hospital.
Two Spanish tourists were killed in 2022 when a hot air balloon made a hard landing following a sightseeing tour of Cappadocia.
A Congolese customs worker who resisted corruption is the Catholic Church’s newest model of holiness
A Congolese customs worker who resisted corruption is the Catholic Church’s newest model of holiness
- Floribèrt Bwana Chui Bin Kositi was kidnapped and killed in 2007 after he refused to allow rancid rice from Rwanda to be transported across the border to the eastern Congo city of Goma
- The head of the Vatican’s saint-making office, Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, is presiding over the beatification ceremony Sunday
ROME: The Vatican on Sunday is beatifying a Congolese customs worker who was killed for resisting a bribe, giving young people in a place with endemic corruption a new model of holiness: Someone who refused to allow spoiled rice to be distributed to poor people.
The head of the Vatican’s saint-making office, Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, is presiding over the beatification ceremony Sunday at one of the pontifical basilicas in Rome, St. Paul Outside the Walls.
The event is drawing Congolese pilgrims and much of Rome’s Congolese Catholic community, who will be treated to a special audience Monday with Pope Leo XIV.
Floribèrt Bwana Chui Bin Kositi was kidnapped and killed in 2007 after he refused to allow rancid rice from Rwanda to be transported across the border to the eastern Congo city of Goma.
As an official with the Congolese government’s custom’s quality control office, the 26-year-old knew the risks of resisting bribes offered to public officials. But he also knew the risks of allowing spoiled food to be distributed to the most desperate.
“On that day, those mafiosi found themselves in front of a young man who, in the name of the Gospel, said ‘No.’ He opposed,” his friend Aline Manani said. “And Floribèrt, I think that for me personally, I would say for all young people, is a role model.”
Pope Francis recognized Kositi as a martyr of the faith late last year, setting him on the path to beatification and to possibly become Congo’s first saint. The move fit into the pope’s broader understanding of martyr as a social justice concept, allowing those deemed to have been killed for doing God’s work and following the Gospel to be considered for sainthood.
“Our country almost holds the gold medal for corruption among the countries of the world,” Goma Bishop Willy Ngumbi told reporters last week. “Here, corruption is truly endemic. So, if we could at least learn from this boy’s life that we must all fight corruption … I think that would be very important.”
Transparency International last year gave Congo one of the poorest marks on its corruption perception index, ranking it 163 out of 180 countries surveyed and 20 on the organization’s 0-100 scale, with 0 highly corrupt and 100 very clean.
The beatification has brought joy to Goma at a time of anguish. Violent fighting between government forces and Rwanda-backed M23 rebels has led to the death of thousands of people and the rebels’ capture of the city has exacerbated what already was one of the world’s biggest humanitarian crises.
It has renewed the hopes of many in the country of more than 100 million people whose development has been stifled by chronic corruption, which Francis railed about during his 2023 visit to the country.
Speaking at the Kinshasa stadium then, Francis said Kositi “could easily have turned a blind eye; nobody would have found out, and he might even have gotten ahead as a result. But since he was a Christian, he prayed. He thought of others and he chose to be honest, saying no to the filth of corruption.”
The Italian priest who spearheaded Kositi’s sainthood case, the Rev. Francesco Tedeschi, knew him through their work with the Saint’Egidio Community. He broke down Saturday as he recounted Kositi’s example and Francis’ call for the church to recognize the ordinary holiness in the “saints next door.”
“In the end, this was what Floribert was, because he was just a boy,” Tedeschi said as he began weeping.
At Goma’s Floribert Bwana Chui School of Peace, which is named in honor of Kositi and advocates for social justice, his beatification is encouraging everyone who sees him as a role model, school director Charles Kalimba told The Associated Press.
“It’s a lesson for every generation, for the next generation, for the present generation and for all people. Floribert’s life is a positive point that must be presented to the Congolese nation. We are in a country where corruption is almost allowed, and this is a challenge that must be taken up,” Kalimba said.
Rev. Tedeschi said the martyr designation recognized Kositi died out of hatred for the faith, because his decision to not accept the spoiled food was inspired by the Christian idea of the dignity of everyone, especially the poor.
Being declared a martyr exempts Kositi from the requirement that a miracle must be attributed to his intercession before he is beatified, thereby fast-tracking the process to get to the first step of sainthood. The Vatican must, however, confirm a miracle attributed to his intercession for him to be canonized, a process that can take years or more.
