DHAKA: Bangladesh’s top court on Wednesday temporarily suspended quotas for coveted government jobs after thousands of students staged nationwide protests against what they call a discriminatory system, lawyers said.
The quota system reserves more than half of well-paid and massively over-subscribed civil service posts, totaling hundreds of thousands of government jobs, for specific groups including children of liberation heroes.
Students launched protests earlier this month, demanding a merit-based system, with demonstrations on Wednesday blocking highways and railway lines.
“We will not return to classrooms until our demand is met,” protest leader Rasel Ahmed of Chittagong University said.
The quota system was abolished in 2018 after weeks of protests, but reinstated in June by Dhaka’s High Court, sparking fury from students.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday suspended that order for a month, said lawyer Shah Monjurul Hoque, who represents two students seeking to end the quota system.
Hoque said that Chief Justice Obaidul Hassan had also requested that students return to class.
Despite the call, student groups continued to block key highways and railway tracks, bringing traffic movement in much of the capital Dhaka and several major cities to a halt.
“This (court) order is temporary. We want a permanent executive order from the government, saying that the quotas are abolished, except some quotas for the disabled and minorities,” said Parvez Mosharraf, a student at Dhaka University.
He was among dozens of students who laid timber logs on a railway track at Dhaka’s Karwan Bazar, forcing the halt of train services connecting the capital to northern Bangladesh.
The quota system reserves 30 percent of government posts for children of those who fought to win Bangladeshi independence in 1971, 10 percent for women, and 10 percent for residents of specific districts.
Students said only those quotas supporting ethnic minorities and disabled people — six percent of jobs — should remain.
“We don’t also want the job quotas for women because women are no longer lagging behind,” female student Meena Rani Das, 22, said.
“Women are marching ahead with their talents. But the quota system is creating obstacles and snatching our rights.”
Critics say the system benefits children of pro-government groups, who back Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, was Bangladesh’s founding leader.
Hasina, 76, won her fourth consecutive general election in January, in a vote without genuine opposition parties, with a widespread boycott and a major crackdown against her political opponents.
Critics accuse Bangladeshi courts of rubber-stamping decisions made by her government.
Hasina has condemned the protests, saying the matter had been settled by the court.
“Students are wasting their time,” Hasina said Sunday, adding there was “no justification for the anti-quota movement.”
Thousands of students on Wednesday threw up barricades across key intersections in Dhaka, as well as blocking major highways connecting the capital to other cities, police said.
Hemayetul Islam, deputy police chief in the northwestern city of Rajshahi said that “at least 200 students” blocked the highway to Dhaka.
“Brilliant students no longer get the jobs they want because of this quota system,” said Halimatuz Sadia, a protester and physics student at Chittagong University.
“You work hard only to find out that there are only a limited number of jobs available,” she added.
Bangladesh suspends job quotas after student protests
https://arab.news/69sh3
Bangladesh suspends job quotas after student protests
- Quota system reserves more than half of well-paid and massively over-subscribed civil service posts for specific groups including children of liberation heroes
- The quota system was abolished in 2018 after weeks of protests, but reinstated in June by Dhaka’s High Court, sparking fury from students
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.
