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The Khulna bureau chief of Sangram, Sheikh Belaluddin, wounded in a bomb attack on February 5, died in Combined Medical Hospital in Dhaka on Friday.
   Hospital sources said the condition of Belal deteriorated further on Thursday. ‘He was declared dead at about 11:00am,’ the Sangram chief reporter told New Age on Friday.
   After the post-mortem examination at the Dhaka Medical College Hospital morgue, the body was first taken to the Jamaat office at Purana Paltan.
   His janaza was held at the Baitul Mokarram Mosque. People from a cross-section of society, including information minister and information secretary, joined the janaza.
   The minister for information, M Shamsul Islam, told newsmen that the culprits must be brought to book and punished. ‘We have taken steps to arrest the people responsible so that no such incidents take place.’
   Belal’s brother-in-law, Golam Parwar MP, hoped the killers would be arrested and punished. ‘The government has taken steps and we hope all the killers will be punished.’
   The body of Belal, who was also president of the Khulna Metropolitan Journalists’ Union, was kept in BIRDEM Hospital.
   It will be taken to his village home in a helicopter Saturday morning for burial. Another janaza will be held at the Khulna Circuit House before burial in his family graveyard.
   Belal and three other journalists, including the Prothom Alo bureau chief, Sheikh Abu Hasan, were injured when a bomb went off in front of the Khulna Press Club on February 5.
   The bomb blew up two motorcycles parked inside the club premises.
   Belal was admitted to Khulna Medical College Hospital where he had surgeries.
   As his condition deteriorated, he was flown into the capital in a helicopter the next day was admitted to Combined Military Hospital.
   The bomb attack sparked off widespread protests by journalists in Khulna and the capital.
   Journalists have been going out on demonstrations demanding the arrest of and punishment for the culprits. The police are yet to make any headway in their investigation.

The journalists and people related to the press in the Khulna division are now passing their days amid fear and anxiety as 14 journalists were killed and at least 50 injured in the past 10 years in the region.
   The police said the Khulna city was now the most risky place for the journalists as three leading journalists were killed in separate bomb attacks within twelve months and a half. Besides, another journalist was killed in the city in March, 2002, they added.
   They said two journalists were killed at Dumuria upazila in Khulna in 2001. Other eight journalists were killed in other districts of the divisions in the past 10 years, they added.
   According to the police and news items published on dailies, a very powerful bomb was hurled in the Khulna Press Club on February 5, which injured four journalists, including Sheikh Belaluddin, the staff correspondent of Daily Sangram, critically. Belaluddin died at the Combined Military Hospital in the capital on February 11.
   Another bomb was hurled on a local daily editor, Humayun Kabir Balu, in the Khulna city at his office-cum residence, where he died only seven months back on June 27, 2004, the police said.
   A bomb was hurled on the Khulna-based New Age staff correspondent, Manik Saha, also a former Khulna Press Club president, on January 15, 2004 on the Chhota Mirzapur Road. He died on the spot.
   Nahor Ali and Shukur Ali of Dumuria, both journalists of a local daily, Anirban, were killed in 2001. Shamsur Rahman Kebol, a Jessore-based special correspondent of the Daily Janakantha, was killed on July 16 and Jhenaidah-based journalist Mir Ilias Hossain Dilip was killed on January 15 in 2000.
   The Jessor-based daily Runner editor, Saiful Islam Mukul, also general secretary of the Kaligang Press Club, and journalist Bajlur Rahman of Chuadanga were killed in 1998. The Satkhira-based daily Patradut editor, SM Alauddin, was shot to death in 1996.
   Farukh Hossain, a journalist of Avaynagar upazila in Satkhira, was killed in 1995 while Abdul Gaffar of local daily Sphulinga was killed in 1994.
   The police said assailants hurled a bomb on the Khulna-based staff correspondent of the daily Jugantar, Dip Azad, at the Moylapota crossing under Khulna Sadar thana on January 4. He escaped unhurt as the bomb did not explode, the police added.
   The Khulna Press Club president, Sheikh Abu Hasan, Zahidul Islam and Tutul, who were injured in the February 5 bomb attack in the Khulna Press Club, are passing their days in utter anxiety.
   Newsmen in the region are now in anxiety and under pressure of their family members to leave their profession as newsmen and people related to the press are being victims to attacks one after another, local sources said.
   A good number of journalists in the region already quit their profession and some journalists of the Khulna city left the city in the past one year.
   Some journalists in the Khulna city said failure in unearthing the killers and masterminds of the attacks on the journalists was encouraging the killers.
   The journalists said Khulna was no more safe for them as they repeatedly received death threats for reporting criminal activities in the region.
   A top Khulna police official told New Age that action would be taken against the perpetrators and security would be ensured to the journalists. The police are trying their best to nab the attackers, he added.

The prime minister, Khaleda Zia, has said her government would do everything possible to identify the masterminds of the Khulna Press Club bomb attack.
   Khaleda said this while expressing her shock at the death of journalist Sheikh Belaluddin.
   The Khulna bureau chief of the Bangla daily Sangram, wounded in a bomb attack on February 5, died in the Combined Medical Hospital in Dhaka on Friday.
   The prime minister in a condolence message expressed her deep shock and prayed for salvation of the departed soul.
   She also conveyed her heartfelt sympathy to the members of the bereaved family.
   The information minister, M Shamsul Islam, the industries minister and the Jamaat-Islami Bangladesh amir, Motiur Rahman Nizami, the social welfare minister and the Jamaat secretary general, Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed, the Jatiya Press Club president, Reazuddin Ahmed, and the general secretary, Shawkat Mahmud, the Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists president, Gias Kamal Chowdhury, and the secretary general, Ruhul Amin Gazi, the Dhaka Union of Journalists president, Elahi Newaz Khan and the general secretary, Sardar Farid Ahmed, also expressed their shock at the death.
   They demanded arrest of and punishment for the culprits.

Followers of the self-styled vigilante leader Bangla Bhai may soon take vindictive actions against those they consider ‘enemies’ of their ‘cleansing operation’, fear many people in Bagmara in Rajshahi district.
   Some of them, especially public representatives of the entire upazila, expressed apprehension that the ‘core followers’ of the extremist leader might turn into self-styled guerrillas, threatening the security of the area.
   They said the emergence of Azizur Rahman alias Bangla Bhai, the leader of the Jagrata Muslim Janata, was supported by a section of the local people, apparently to combat the self-styled outlaws, the Sarbaharas, who have been engaged in terrorist activities in the region for long.
   With his actions under the scrutiny of the global media now, Bangla Bhai is on the run, but many residents of the area are afraid of further repercussion if and when his activists get a chance to launch further attacks.
   ‘Their operation to uproot the underground party members has apparently come to an end. So, now they may launch another operation against the persons they believe to be their enemies,’ a local representative of Taherpur told New Age last week.
   Abdul Khalek, senior vice president of the Taherpur municipality unit of the Awami League, said the Jagrata Muslim Janata had earlier killed members of so-called underground parties, gaining tacit support from the local people.
   The Bangla Bhai-men, as a result, established their own stronghold in the area. ‘Now it is their turn to launch another operation to kill Awami League leaders,’ he added.
   A municipality chairman, also an Awami League leader, admitted that they had initially supported the Bangla Bhai people to get rid of the Sarbahara-men.
   ‘The result is now at our hands. But we have now realised that we have committed a mistake by supporting an extremist force against another such group,’ he said, citing the example of Bangla Bhai’s supporters’ recent attack of Mokbul Hossain, who is not a member of any extremist party.
   Mokbul, chairman of Sreepur union parishad and president of Bhabaniganj unit Awami League, once helped Bangla Bhai ‘by every possible means’, but he was not spared from the alleged JMJ attack.
   Hearing his cry for help and an announcement over mike that claimed Sarbahara men had fired gunshots and hurled bombs to kill the UP chairman, the villagers chased the attackers and beat three of them to death.
   Mokbul used to attend meetings of Bangla Bhai and many of his family members and close associates joined the JMJ and took active role in elimination of Purba Banglar Communist Party activists from the area.
   Following the January 25 incident, the inhabitants of the locality have become frustrated that the JMJ might turn into a new ‘Frankenstein’ of the area.
   ‘Most of the JMJ leaders who went into hiding may abruptly return and conduct attack on their opponents,’ a cell phone trader at Bagmara Bazar told New Age.
   According to the locals, Bangla Bhai established his organisation at a time when there was a great need for such an organisation. ‘We welcomed it as our saviour from the grip of the underground parties,’ said a man of the locality.
   Press reports say a total of 41 people at Raninagar and Atrai upazilas of Noagoan district were killed by the Purba Banglar Communist Party since 1998 and 19 people in Rajshahi district since April 1995.
   Of the 41 killed in Atrai and Raninagar, 13 belonged to the Awami League and 7 to the BNP and its front organisations.
   Of the 19 persons murdered in Rajshahi district, 7 were elected representatives of union councils and the metropolitan.
   Of them, the most gruesome incident was the murder of six people in Atrai in April 2003.
   Bangla Bhai launched his ‘crackdown’ on the extremists on April 1, 2004. The militant has tortured 15 suspected outlaws to death and maimed dozens of others since he launched his operations.
   People united and helped Bangla Bhai against the outlaws after having been brutalised for so many years.

The police are allegedly harassing the students of Rajshahi University by searching their messes and hostels outside the campus to pick up Bangla Bhai and his associates as well as criminals.
   The students of different messes at Binodpur, Kazla, Motihar, Budhpara, Mirzapur, Dharampur, and Meherchandi told newsmen that the police continued their raid on the hostels in search of Bangla Bhai and his associates.
   The Motihar police have already directed the mess owners to send photos and bio-data of the students within February 15.
   They were asked to follow the directives not for harassing genuine students but for the arrest of Bangla Bhai and criminals, they added.
   Earlier the police issued notices, signed by the officer-in-charge, Akram Hossain, to the mess owners to send photos and bio-data of the boarders.
   The police said a number of criminals, including the members of underground Purba Banglar Communist Party, were taking shelter in the messes. To ensure security of the students, the measures had been taken, they said.
   The university proctor told newsmen that he was aware of the police raid on the student messes outside the campus but he has yet to receive any written complaint from the student.

Chittagong arms haul is the focal point of international investigation agencies for the investigation of the bomb and grenade blasts in Bangladesh.
   Sources said the Federal Bureau of Investigation, requested by the government to investigate the January 27 blast in which former finance minister Shah AMS Kibria was killed, focused on the arms haul in Chittagong to begin with the assignment.
   The US agency expressed similar opinion when its team came to Bangladesh after the August 21, 2004 grenade attack on an Awami League rally in Dhaka. The leader of the opposition in parliament, Sheikh Hasina, escaped the attack; 23 were killed.
   Scotland Yard investigators who came to Bangladesh after an attempt on the British high commissioner, Anwar Chowdhury, at the shrine of Hazrat Shahjalal, in which three people were killed on May 21, 2004, said the investigation should begin with the arms recovery in Chittagong.
   Interpol investigators, who came to Dhaka after the August 21 grenade attack, also made similar observations.
   All the international investigation agencies said the grenade blasts are linked to the Chittagong arms consignment, said the sources.
   They said the international investigators observed that finding out the source, destination and couriers of the arms, hauled in Chittagong on April 2, 2004, was very important for unmasking the culprits behind the grenade attacks.
   Law enforcing agencies seized 1,790 firearms, including AK-47 rifles, rocket launchers, Chinese submachine guns, submachine carbines, anti-tank rifles, and auto-spotting rifles, when they were loaded in trucks in a jetty in the River Karnaphuli, near Chittagong port.
   In the biggest-ever arms and ammunition recovery in Bangladesh’s history, the law enforcers also seized explosives, including 1,143,520 bullets, 6,392 magazines and 27,020 hand grenades.
   The police arrested 14 people, mostly truck drivers, assistants and boatmen, in connection with the recovery. Seven of them are now in jail; the remaining seven are free on bail.
   The FBI agent who came to Dhaka this week held a series of meetings with officials of the Ministry of Home Affairs to work out the terms of reference for a full investigation to be carried out by the US agency.
   The prime minister, Khaleda Zia, on February 7 was informed by the US ambassador to Bangladesh, Harry K Thomas, of the possible terms of reference for ‘US law-enforcement assistance.’
   They agreed that the ‘matter should be pursued with appropriate officials at the Ministry of Home Affairs.’
   The prime minister at the meeting also assured Washington of all supports for the investigation of the January 27 grenade blast.
   The US administration earlier made it clear that its investigators would have to be given full access to all evidences after the government had sought the US agency’s cooperation in the investigation of Kibria’s killing.
   The US assistant secretary of state, Christina Rocca, reportedly told the minister for foreign affairs, M Morshed Khan, that they could provide intelligence assistance if Dhaka gave them full access to all evidences.
   The US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, talked with Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina on the matter over telephone.

The abduction of two police sergeants continues to remain shrouded in mystery as the police investigators were yet ascertain whether they were abducted at all.
   The one-member inquiry committee formed by the police on Thursday to investigate the abduction case of two traffic police officers almost completed the report. The committee chief, additional commissioner Faruk Hossain, will submit the report on Saturday. A doctor of Rajarbagh Police Line Hospital told the New Age that they could not find any sedative chemical in examination.
   Another high official of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police said if the committee found any false statements given by the ‘abducted’ police officers, they might lose their job. ‘We will take action against the two policemen if they are found guilty,’ the officer said.
   Two traffic police sergeants, reportedly abducted from Kafrul Wednesday night, were released Thursday afternoon, the police earlier said.
   The family members of the victims said they freed the policemen by paying Tk 2 lakh.
   The traffic policemen, Asaduzzaman and Monirul Islam Sujan, working in the Gulshan zone, were abducted from Mirpur Section 14 in the Kafrul police area when they, in plainclothes, were on their way to their Shyamali residence at about 9:30pm Wednesday.

Pakistan’s two top opposition leaders, former prime ministers, Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, met in exile on Thursday and pledged to fight together for the restoration of a ‘real democracy’ in their homeland.
   Bhutto met with her erstwhile rival in the western Saudi Arabian city of Jeddah, where Sharif has lived since his exile in late 2000. Bhutto has spent the past five years in self-imposed exile for fear of arrest on corruption charges.
   The meeting, which lasted for two and a half hours, was their first since the president, Pervez Musharraf, ousted Sharif in a bloodless and popular military coup in late 1999.
   Opposition against Musharraf, a key ally in the US-led war on terrorism, has fallen into disarray without any strong personality inside Pakistan. Parliamentary elections are due in 2007.
   Bhutto was accompanied by her husband Asif Ali Zardari, who was released on bail in November after spending eight years in jail on charges ranging from murder to corruption.
   Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League issued a statement after the meeting saying Pakistan must revert to ‘real democracy’ as soon as possible through free, fair and transparent elections.
   ‘Both parties will cooperate and work at every level to achieve this sacred goal,’ it said. ‘They resolved that they would not act in any way that would help non-democratic forces to negate ... democratic rights of the people of Pakistan.’
   Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party issued a similar statement. ‘Both leaders agreed to adopt a minimum programme for restoration of democracy in Pakistan,’ it said.
   He argues that genuine democracy is working in Pakistan and rejects calls for elections earlier than 2007.
   Islamists provide the main opposition to Musharraf, who has co-opted the rump of Sharif’s Muslim League to back his government.
   Many observers, however, believe Musharraf’s natural constituency lies within the more liberal ranks of the PPP, but mutual dislike with Bhutto has prevented any deal so far.
   Musharraf, who has in the past derided both former prime ministers as venal politicians, has made reconciliatory moves in recent months—most notably through the release of Zardari.
   The government also returned the passport of a nephew of Sharif to let him go abroad to see his family.
   Political observers believe Musharraf may be seeking to find favour with the PPP and Sharif’s Muslim League faction after angering Islamist parties by going back on his promise to step down as army chief by the end of last year.

The Commonwealth told Pakistan’s Pervez Musharraf on Friday to give up his dual role as president and chief of staff of the army by 2007.
   ‘The group ... urged president Musharraf to relinquish one of the two offices,’ members of the Ministerial Action Group of the 53-member club of mainly former British colonies said in a statement after a meeting in London.

The government should uphold the basic rights of the Ahmadiyas to exercise religious functions and should withdraw the ban on their publications, the community leaders said at a congregation on Friday.
   The three-day congregation, National Salana Jalsa, began on Friday in the central office of the Ahmadiya Muslim Jamaat at Bakshibazar in Dhaka.
   Firoz Alam, representative of the community’s grand imam, Mirza Masrur Ahmad, opened the function.
   The inaugural session was also addressed by Justice KM Sobhan, the Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal president, Hasanul Haq Inu, Justice Mizanul Haq Nasim, the New Age editor, Enayetullah Khan, columnist Shahriyar Kabir, lawyer Sara Hossain, Tarique Ali of the Sammilita Samajik Andolan, the organisation’s Bangladesh chapter nayeb-e-amir, Mir Mobassher Ali, Maulana Abdul Awwal Khan Chowdhury and Ahmad Tabshir Chowdhury.
   Firoz urged the Ahmadiyas to stand united to face the hurdles in practising their religion.
   Hasanul Haq Inu urged all to unite to effectively face the armed Islamist bigots and criminals were dominating politics.
   ‘The government has turned a bind eye in political interests although the criminals and the armed Islamist bigots are dominating politics,’ he said. ‘We are to face them [criminals and bigots].’
   Enayetullah blamed the government for showing weaknesses in facing the bigots, who attempted to intrude into Ahmadiya mosques.
   He also blamed the leading political parties, engaged in a struggle for power, for providing lip-service only to the Ahmadiyas.
   He demanded withdrawal of the ban on Ahmadiya publications and returning of the control over the Ahmadiya mosques forcefully dispossessed by the bigots.
   KM Sobhan put out a call for all to protest against the armed communal bigots.
   ‘We are to face the people who want to turn Bangladesh into a religion-state, on all fronts,’ said Shahriyar. ‘They will have to be fought politically, socially, culturally and theologically.’
   It is the constitutional rights of the Ahmadiyas to practise religion, but the government curtailed their rights by imposing the ban, said Sara Hossain, referring to the January 8, 2004 ban on Ahmadiya publications in the face of pressure from the Islamist radicals.
   The Ahmadiyas are passing their days in disarray as the Islamist bigots continue threatening them across the country and the government has kept silent about it, the speakers said.

Bangladesh’s vital garments sector expects to attract more than one billion dollars in foreign direct investment over the next couple of years following the lifting of a decade-old ban, officials said Friday.
   Direct investment by foreign firms in apparel industry outside the export processing zones (EPZs) was previously banned to ensure that only Bangladeshi companies benefited from the textile export quotas.
   The cabinet approved allowing foreigners to invest directly in the industry outside EPZs as well last month following the phasing out of an international quota pact which gave Bangladesh guaranteed access to markets in the United States and Europe.
   ‘We’re confident the government step will help us woo more than one billion dollars of foreign direct investment in the sector and create more than a million job in the next couple of years,’ chief executive of the country’s investment promotion office, Mahmudur Rahman, told AFP.
   ‘It’s a huge development as far as our survival in the quota-free textile regime is concerned,’ he said.
   ‘We did not oppose the move. More foreign investment means more competition which is good for the industry,’ president of the Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association Annisul Huq said.
   Huq, however, warned that smaller factories stood to lose from the withdrawal of the quotas because foreign firms would pay higher wages.
   The garments industry generates 75 per cent of the country’s annual foreign revenues ($5.7 billion).
   Reports have said at least five firms of India, which has a massive garments sector, were interested in setting up production units in Bangladesh as part of a drive to expand production worldwide. The Indian firms were seeking joint-venture partnerships with Bangladeshi companies, the reports said.
   Most international surveys have said smaller Bangladesh garment factories would be shut down and nearly one million workers, mostly women, would lose jobs as a result of the end of the multifibre arrangement (MFA).
   Some 1.8 million people, mostly women earning between 25 and 35 dollars a month, are employed in the sector.
   The MFA quota system ended on December 31 last year prompting the United Nations Development Fund to predict that one million jobs could be wiped out as Bangladesh loses out to China.
   Experts say it could be up to a year before the impact of the MFA’s expiry is clear.

Leader of the opposition in parliament Sheikh Hasina accused the prime minister, Khaleda Zia, of not believing in the country’s independence and patronising ultra-right extremists to eliminate progressive forces.
   Hasina, also Awami League president, made the comments Friday while exchanging views with leaders of professional bodies to carry forward the anti-government movement. The meeting was held at the Institute of Engineers Bangladesh in Dhaka.
   She called upon the people to expedite the fall of the ruling coalition, which she termed as the only obstacle of the nation.
   ‘The prime minister does not believe in the independence of the country and patronises radicals to eliminate the progressive forces,’ she said.
   Hasina claimed that she had come to know that the government had prepared a blue-
   print to kill the popular opposition leaders at the root-
   levels using elite forces.
   Leaders of professional bodies, aligned with the Awami League attended the meeting and urged for a common set of programmes that every organisation would carry out.
   Hasina said the government destroyed all the democratic institutions through politicising the administration and the judiciary, which she termed as a bid to rig the election.
   Awami League general secretary, Abdul Jalil, said, ‘The progressives should come under one umbrella to fight out the autocratic Khaleda-Nizami regime.’
   The meeting was addressed among others by lawyers Amirul Islam and Rokon Uddin Mahmud, economists Khalikuzzaman, Atiur Rahman and Abul Barakat, DU teachers’ association leaders AAMS Arefin Siddique, Saidur Rahmanan and Aktaruzzaman and cultural leader Abdul Kuddus.
   Awami League publication secretary, Asaduzzaman Noor, conducted the programme.

Three suspected criminals, including a regional leader of an underground party, were killed in crossfire between their accomplices and the police in Dhaka, Chittagong and Pabna early Friday.
   The police said Khokon alias China Khokon, 32, was killed in the capital, Mohammad Selim alias Kana Selim in Chittagong and Motalib alias Matleb, 35, a leader of the Purba Banglar Communist Party (ML-Lal Pataka) and accused in 10 murder and several other cases, in Pabna.
   They said Khokon, a resident of Enayetganj Lane in Hajaribagh, was killed in a shootout near Sikder Medical College and Hospital on the bank of the river Buriganga at about 4:30am.
   The gunfight ensued when a patrol team of the Hajaribagh police went to the spot and Khokon and his accomplices, planning for an operation, opened shots on them.
   Two other patrol teams also took part in the encounter in which at least 30 rounds of bullet were exchanged. The police fired nine shots.
   At one stage Khokon received bullets while his associates managed to flee.
   He was taken to Dhaka Medical College Hospital where the doctors declared him dead, the police said. ‘A constable also received bullets.’
   The police recovered a one-shooter gun and a pistol and three bullets from the spot.
   New Age staff correspondent from Chittagong reports: Selim of Chandraghona, arrested from the local ferryghat Thursday afternoon, was killed in crossfire at Kodala in Rangunia when he was taken there to recover arms as per his statement at about 3:00am.
   As they reached near Kodala tea garden, accomplices of Selim fired shots on the police prompting them to retaliate, the police said.
   Caught in crossfire, Selim died on the spot. Others, however, managed to escape.
   New Age Pabna correspondent adds: Matleb, arrested Thursday afternoon from Puspapara, was killed in an hour-long gunfight at Shimulchara village in Pabna sadar.
   He was taken there to recover arms and nab his accomplices.
   The gunfight took place as his followers opened fire on the police and tried to snatch him.
   Matleb received bullets while trying to flee. He was taken to Pabna General Hospital where the doctors pronounced him dead, the police said.
   They recovered a shutter gun and some ammunition from the spot.

Eight rooms of the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education, widely known as Shiksha Bhaban, have been occupied by a dozen of employees’ unions hampering the activities of the directorate.
   Sources in the directorate said the leaders of the employees’ unions, majority of Class III or IV employees, are rarely found at their respective desks.
   The rooms they have occupied are used mainly for holding their associations’ meetings and doing secretarial jobs, sources added.
   ‘The unions are divided into two or three factions and its leaders keep themselves busy with unscrupulous business with the blessings of some influential persons at the office,’ said an
   official.
   The Combined Council of Government Employees of Secondary and Higher Education Directorate, led by Salehuddin Selim, and the Association of Class III Employees of the Directorate, led by Khurram Mollah, mainly dominate the factions in the directorate. Both the factions consist of Class III employees of the directorate.
   ‘Wherever I sit at any desk it becomes my office,’ Selim said when he was asked about his desk on Sunday.
   ‘Two rooms have been allocated for me — one is my genuine desk and I am the caretaker of the office for another.’
   Though Selim is supposed to sit at the non-government school desk on second floor of the office, he rarely attends there. Similarly, Khurram is supposed to sit at the office of the audit department of Physical Education Section but he was found at the corridor of the office of the director general at noon on Monday.
   Other organisations include the Bangladesh Technical Education Directorate Employees Association, Education Engineer-ing Directorate Diploma Engi-neers Association, Education Engineering Directorate Emplo-yees Welfare Association, Welfare Council of Bangladesh Develop-ment Project Officers and Employees, Association of Direc-torate of Compulsory Primary Education, Association of Drivers of Shiksha Bhaban, Association of Bangladesh Class IV Emplo-yees, and Welfare Association of Directorate of Inspection and Audit.
   The director general, Profe-ssor Dilara Hafiz, told New Age on Monday that she would form a number of committees to deal with such problems which had been piled up for years.
   ‘I have just sat at the chair,’ Dilara added saying that necessary measures must be taken to solve such problems.
   The responsibilities of the directorate are to monitor and supervise the administrative affairs of all the secondary and higher educational institutions, including madrassahs and other special organisations across the country.
   There are over 16,000 non-government high schools, 2,000 intermediate colleges, and more than 7,000 madrassahs under the directorate, which is also to look after the administrative affairs of 273 government colleges and 324 government high schools.

Incidents of sea piracy in the maritime territories of Bangladesh declined by over 70 per cent in 2004 compared to such incidents in 2003, said the annual sea piracy report of the International Maritime Bureau released on February 6.
   According to the Malaysia-based piracy reporting centre of the IMB, Bangladesh has improved its position and currently ranks as the third most dangerous sea territory in Asia with 17 attacks recorded in 2004.
   In 2003 Bangladesh ranked as the second most dangerous country after Indonesia. That year the number of piracies recorded off Bangladesh was 58.
   ‘Bangladesh has elevated its position at number thee among the Asian countries with 17 incidents,’ the IMB piracy report said.
   Indonesia has retained its position with 93 piracy incidents while the Malacca Strait, which separates Indonesia from Malaysia, took second position with 37 incidents, the piracy report said.
   Officials of the Department of Shipping said the government has managed a drastic reduction of sea piracy due to some timely measures taken by the authorities including introduction of International Ships and Port facility Security Code from July 2004.
   Besides, a port security committee has also been formed to review the overall situation of the country’s two ports — Chittagong and Mongla — and the long coastal areas every month.
   The officials hoped that sea piracy would further reduce when Bangladesh signs a regional pact involving 16 Asian countries to combat piracy in seawater in a joint collaboration.
   The countries are Bangladesh, Japan, China, Malaysia, India, Indonesia, South Korea, the Philippines, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam. Representatives from these countries have already finalised a draft of the agreement at a recent meeting in Tokyo.
   According to the Ministry of Shipping, some 1,500 ships anchor in the country’s two ports every year. Besides, more than 200 coastal ships, around 70 deep-sea trawlers and more than 2,000 fishing boats regularly use different routes in the Bay of Bengal.
   According to the IMB report, worldwide actual or attempted piracy attacks declined to 325 from 445 in 2003, but violence against seafarers continues and remains at high levels.

The incidences of piracy have increased in different rivers of the southern region as well as the Meghna Estuary in recent times.
   Pirates killed ten fishermen and injured 100 others in the bay and the rivers, including the Meghna, in the last six months.
   They also looted fish, nets, valuables, and Tk 10 lakh from the fishermen during the period, according to the victims, police sources, and reports published in different local and national dailies.
   The pirates looted valuables and Tk 2 lakh from seven fishing trawlers in the river Meghna in Daulatkhan upazila of Bhola in the last week, injuring 12 fishermen critically.
   One fisherman was feared drowned and 14 others were injured when a pirate gang swooped on a fishing trawler in the estuary of the bay at Kalkini under Charfasson upazila of Bhola on February 6.
   The injured — Rahman, 50, Zakir, 40, Rashed, 55, Babul, 25, Nurul Islam, 40, Taher, 35, Gajnabi, 30, Khaleq, 35, Dulal, 30, and Abdul Rab, 32 — were admitted to Daulatkhan Upazila Health Complex.
   The injured said the pirates beat them up mercilessly and later confined them in the hold of the trawler.
   The pirates threw one of the injured, Noor-e-Alam, 34, into the sea who had been missing since the incident, they said adding the sea robbers looted fish, net, fuel, and engine with cash money amounting to Tk 5 lakh.
   The Fishing Trawlers Owners Association president, Golam Mustafa Chaudhury, said they urged the authorities concerned several times to intensify patrol of the navy ships and coastguards to protect the lives and properties of fishermen but in vain.

Famed US playwright Arthur Miller, who had been ill with cancer, pneumonia and a heart condition, has died, US media reported Friday.
   Before he died, a New York Post article said his family members were by his side and that Miller was not doing well. His death was later reported by US television.
   The 89-year-old author of such classics as ‘Death of a Salesman’ and ‘The Crucible,’ who was once married to Marilyn Monroe, had been in hospice care at Copeland’s New York apartment since his release from hospital several weeks ago, the Post reported.
   Earlier this week, he was moved at his request to an 18th-century farmhouse in Connecticut, which he bought with Monroe in 1958.

Three employees of the country’s leading non-governmental organisation BRAC were injured, when a couple of bombs were hurled at its local office in Mahimaganj under Gobindaganj upazila in Gaibandha, on Thursday night.
   The police and the NGO sources said four suspected criminals riding on two motor cycles first hurled a bomb at the office at about 9:00pm that badly damaged corrugated iron sheet roof of the office.
   As the panic-stricken employees were coming out of the office through the main gate, the second bomb was hurled, leaving Faridul Islam, Swapan Kumar and Shamim Ahmed injured, the sources said.
   The injured were later treated at a local clinic.
   The police cordoned off the area after the incident and the district police super, Bhanu Lal Das after visiting the spot said the bomb attack that was carried out was similar to that of some other previous attacks in the area.

The Bangladesh Chhatra League, student wing of the Awami League, will enforce a dawn-to-dusk hartal in Bagatipara and Lalpur upazilas in Natore on Saturday demanding arrest of the killers of its former leader, Abdur Rashid.
   Rashid was shot dead by unidentified assailants in Lalpur upazila on Thursday. Police sources said he might have been killed over an intra-party conflict.
   The shutdown programme was announced at a meeting on the North Bengal Sugar Mills premises after namaz-e-janaza of Rashid.

The Habiganj police on Friday arrested a local Awami League leader in connection with the January 27 grenade attack that left former finance minister, Shah AMS Kibria along with four other AL leaders dead.
   The police sources in Habiganj said Zahid an AL leader who conducted the January 27 meeting at Baidder Bazar Primary School, where the grenade attack was made, was arrested in the morning and was taken in an 8-day police remand.
   The two local BNP leaders, Joinal Abedin and Shah Alam those who were arrested soon after the grenade attack were taken under a fresh remand for five days from Thursday.
   Earlier, during their 8-day remand that ended Wednesday they were interrogated by the joint interrogation cell.

Nepal’s new government headed by king Gyanendra will deploy troops and helicopters to foil a countrywide road blockade threatened by Maoist rebels from Sunday, security officials said.
   The rebels called the blockade to protest against the seizure of absolute power by king Gyanendra on February 1.
   Similar blockades in December and August virtually cut off overland routes into the country’s capital, severely disrupting food and fuel supplies and sending prices soaring.
   ‘We are well aware of the Maoist blockade but we will definitely foil their (plans) and clear the roads to ensure the continuation of supply lines,’ an army officer said Friday.
   ‘Army helicopters will escort vehicles carrying supplies including petroleum products and other essential goods from India,’ the officer said.
   A statement from Maoist leader Prachanda last weekend urged citizens to stock up with vital provisions and come out ‘in strong resistance’ to what it said was ‘Nazi-style repression’ by the king’s forces.
   ‘Our party challenges Gyanendra ... to withdraw his retrogressive steps immediately,’ Prachanda said.
   ‘If he fails to withdraw ... our party will be compelled to come out for countrywide blockade and traffic strike for uncertain time, from 13 February.’

Supporters of Jewish settlers attacked Benjamin Netanyahu at a wedding but the former Israeli prime minister escaped unhurt, the police and media said Friday.
   A small group vehemently opposed to prime minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to withdraw Israelis from the Gaza Strip shouted at Netanyahu: ‘Murde-rer, your day will come’ in the Thursday evening incident, the daily Yedioth Ahronoth said.
   Reports said a plate was thrown at Netanyahu, now finance minister, at the wedding in the ultra-Orthodox village of Kfar Habad near Ben Gurion International Airport outside Tel Aviv and a police spokesman said a tire on his car was slashed.

US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s paid a surprise visit to Iraq, as the country was rocked by yet more violence, with 13 people killed by a car bomb near a Shia mosque that added fuel to fears of sectarian strife.
   In lightning visits to training bases around the country, Rumsfeld told US troops they could ‘go home with honour’ once Iraqi forces were able to defeat guerrillas.
   The latest guerrilla attack underlined how vulnerable those forces still are.
   In Balad Ruz, some 65 kilometres northeast of the capital, Iraqi forces were lured into a death trap when they received a tip that a car bomb attack was being planned against the local Imam Hussein mosque.
   ‘Security was deployed around the mosque to search for the car but, when they found it, another one went off,’ said officer Maher Salah.