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The leader of opposition in parliament, Sheikh Hasina, on Saturday put out a call for all irrespective of their religions to fight to free the countrymen from the ‘misrule and repression’ of the BNP-led ruling alliance.
   ‘Let us unite to get rid of repression, misrule and misdeed of all sorts of the alliance government and make the country a non-communal in line with the spirit of the war of independence,’ she said.
   Hasina said this when a delegation of the Christian community called on her at Sudha Sadan to exchange greetings on the occasion of Christmas.
   The Christian Association president, Promod Mankin, and the general secretary, Nirmal Rozario, led the delegation. The Archbishop of Dhaka, Paulinus Costa, was also present.
   Hasina, also the Awami League president, conveyed her Christmas greetings to all the Christians of the world.
   ‘We believe in a society of communal harmony where all people can practise their respective religion,’ she said. ‘We have to ensure that no people are persecuted because of their religious faiths.’
   She alleged that after assuming power in 2001, the BNP-Jamaat government had unleashed repression on minority communities.
   Hasina, along with Costa, earlier cut the Christmas Day cake. The Christian community leaders gave a Christmas card and flowers to Sheikh Hasina.

Change of patriarchal thought process of individuals at family and social levels and that of the policymakers dealing with the state affairs is essential for ensuring equality between men and women, speakers told a conference on Saturday.
   They also called for creating a congenial political environment so that women can effectively take part in policymaking process of the state, and restructure various national policies hardly sensitive to women’s political, economic, and cultural rights.
   The Gender Trainers’ and Activists’ Core Group organised the discussions on the closing day of its two-day national conference at the BIAM auditorium in the capital.
   The participants observed that the successive governments had signed a good number of international charters and conventions on women rights, but showed least interest to implement.
   They stressed on more participation of women in the decision-making process at all the levels of society, democratic division of labour, implementation of laws relating women rights, and reviewing discriminatory laws.
   Expressing resentment at the failure of two top politicians — Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina — for reducing discrimination between men and women, the speakers argued that they (Khaleda-Hasina) helped themselves to perpetuate the anti-woman political and economic system.
   The discussants at four sessions on two topics identified different perspectives of the pitiable condition of women and their problems, and suggested some remedies to bring equity for human freedom.
   At one of the sessions, the New Age acting editor, Nurul Kabir, argued that the question of equal rights of women is directly related to a real democratic transformation of the society and the state which would recognise both man and women as sovereign individual entities.
   Arguing that without ensuring equality between men and women, neither a society nor a state can claim to be democratic, he said that men committed to democratic way of life has no alternative, but to actively participate in the women’s rights movements.
   Fauzia Khandaker Eva, a freelance consultant, described vulnerability of women at the family, social, and state levels, arguing for democratisation of the present anti-woman social division of labour between men and women.
   The Channel i chief news editor, Shah Alamgir, Ain O Salish Kendra executive director, Sultana Kamal, and litterateur Selina Hossain also took part in the discussions.
   A summery of the suggestions made by the participants was also presented at the concluding session.

The Garments Sramik O Shilpa Rakkha Jatiya Mancha has demanded that the government should form of a WTO negotiation council aimed at ensuring duty-free access of country’s garment products to major world markets.
   Leaders of the Jatiya Mancha, a combine of 16 labour organisations, made the demand while speaking at a press conference at Asad auditorium in the capital city on Saturday.
   They stressed that a WTO negotiation council should be formed in the greater interests of the nation and the proposed council be equipped with competent government officials, garment owners, labour leaders and civil society members.
   Quamrul Ahsan, a central leader of the Mancha, in his written speech alleged that the Bangladesh official delegation had failed to convey people’s genuine concerns about country’s RMG future at the sixth ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation in Hong Kong.
   The Mancha convenor, Abul Hossain said, ‘We must take preparations from now so that we could bargain properly at the next WTO meetings to press home our demands.’
   Lovely Yesmin, one of the garment leaders who attended the Hong Kong meeting from a non-governmental organisation, said leaders of the Bangladesh delegation were not seen at protest gatherings near the WTO meet venue.
   ‘But, we tried our best to hold demonstrations there braving the police barricades,’ Yesmin added.
   The labour leaders also demanded immediate resignation of the commerce minister, Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, as they said, the minister had failed to achieve the target of Bangladesh at the WTO meet.
   Voicing concern about the country’s RMG sector, the garment leaders said about 40 garment factories have already closed down following the expiry of quota facility which may lead to closure of many more.
   Labour leaders– Alamgir Rani, Sarder Khorshed and Rafiqul Islam Sujan- among others were present at the press conference.

The state minister for home affairs, Lutfozzaman Babar, on Saturday said those who were behind Bangla Bhai and Shaikh Abdur Rahman would have to be smoked out.
   ‘Those who resorted to bomb attacks since August 17 worked as operators only…We will have to find out their patrons,’ he told a discussion on, ‘Terrorism in the eyes of Islam: our responsibility’ at the Jatiya Press Club.
   He said imams, madrassah teachers and ‘alem-olama’ had clearly mentioned that Islam does not support terror activities of militant groups. ‘Those who want to portray Bangladesh as a terrorist nation and Islam as a religion of terrorism are doing these heinous acts.’
   The Jamaat-e-Islami chief, Matiur Rahman Nizami, and the state minister for religious affairs, Mosharef Hossain Shajahan, also spoke at the discussion, organised by the Bangladesh Masjid Mission.
   Nizami has said when a quarter says the bombings will stop if the government resigns, expels the Jamaat from the cabinet and accepts reform proposals, it exposes the purpose of bomb blasts.
   ‘Many top-ranking JMB leaders were arrested, but a quarter is not happy,’ Nizami, also the industries minister, said.

Speakers at a rally at Shaheed Hadis Park in Khulna on Saturday put out a call for a movement for the rights of women in work place.
   A local non-governmental organisation, Rupayan, with the help of Karmajibi Nari, held the rally where hundreds of women workers of industrial areas of Khulna, Satkhira, Bagerhat and Jessore gathered.
   Chaired by Zakia Akther Hossain, the rally was addressed by Karmajibi Nari president Shirin Akhter, Firoz Ahmed, Sheikh Ashrafuzzaman, Khalid Hossain, ward commissioner Kanika Saha and Parul Begum.
   The speakers alleged the women were oppressed in work places and they have no guarantee for wages.
   Most women workers neither have fixed working hours nor proper working environment, alleged the speakers, adding that they were not given appointment letters, identity cards, treatment and maternity leave.
   The speakers again alleged women workers in shrimp processing plants in Khulna work in a dire condition.
   They demanded announcement of a minimum wage, providing appointment letters and identity cards, 16-week maternity leave, proper working environment, treatment and child-care centre for women workers in work place.

The Cabinet is likely to ratify tomorrow the South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA) to allow the trading bloc under the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation to be effective from January 1, 2006.
   Before that, all seven member countries of the organisation will have to inform the SAARC Secretariat of the ratification of the SAFTA by the cabinets of the respective governments.
   Among the SAFTA signatories, the government of Maldives has ratified it as the first country to do so.
   The recent Dhaka summit of the SAARC gave impetus to the process of implementation of the SAFTA in conformity with the agreement signed by the seven governments during the Islamabad summit on January 6, 2004.
   Following ratification of the SAFTA, the National Board of Revenue will issue a circular notifying the customs and tax authorities at land ports, seaports and airports, said sources in the commerce ministry.
   A sensitive list of items prepared by the seven countries will also be provided to them.
   According to understanding reached at the 12th meeting of the committee of experts on SAFTA in Kathmandu on November 29-December 1, the member countries would put their internal mechanism in order by June.

Charge sheet in the case filed in connection with the September 8 explosives haul from a Dakkhin Goran building is likely to be submitted to the court on Monday.
   An inspector of the Detective Branch of police, Ahsan Habib, also the investigation officer of the case filed with the Khilgaon police, said he would submit the charge sheet to the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court.
   Six people — Lokman, Tofail, AHM Shamim, Alam, Masum and Abdus Samad — will be made accused, he said. First four of them are in jail while the latest two are on the run.
   The people detained Samad’s wife, Shammi Akhter, and their domestic help Lokman when they were fleeing shortly after a blast at their ground floor rented flat of the three-storey building at Dakkhin Goran on
   September 8.
   The police also recovered a large sum of explosives and bombs similar to those blasted across the country on August 17.
   But the police did not show Shammi arrested in the case. She was, however, made accused in another case filed with the Demra police in connection with the August 17 blasts near the Jatrabari footbridge.

Suspected members of the Islamist outfit JMB threatened to blow up the Khan Jahan Ali Science and Engineering College in Khulna.
   They issued the threat in a hand-written letter addressed to the principal of the college on December 22, college sources said.
   The principal of the college, Abul Kalam Azad, filed a general diary with local police on Saturday following receipt of the letter.
   One Maulana Ataur Rahman, claiming himself to be the commander in-charge of Khulna district (north), wrote the letter threatening to blow up the college anytime between December 25 and 31.

The Rajshahi city Awami League vice-president, Rafique Uddin, received death threat allegedly from members of the Islamist militant outfit, Jamatul Mujahideen Bangladesh.
   Rafique filed a general diary with the Boalia police station on Saturday, alleging that as he organised a documentary projection in the city on December 20 and 23 on JMB’s torture and countrywide bombing, the extremists threatened him over telephonic.
   He said on December 20 midnight, a caller, passing him off as JMB activist, said ‘Be careful as you are exposing our business.’
   Beside, on December 23 night, the same caller threatened with killing.
   Rafique sought security from the police.

The police picked up seven people from Gulshan in the capital on Friday and seized fake currency notes amounting to Tk 1.86 lakh from their possessions.
   According to the police, they nabbed three of them — Mohammad Jasim, Abul Hossain and Jabed — from Road No 6 at Banani while they were dealing with transaction at noon, and seized 170 notes of Tk 500 denomination.
   Based on their statements, the police raided a house at Shahzadpur Banshtala in the afternoon and arrested four others — Sourav Ahmed Swadhin, Yusuf Ali, Babu alias Selim, and Abdur Rahman.
   Thirty more fake notes of Tk 500 denomination and 860 notes of Tk 100 denomination were seized from their possessions.