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Lawmakers from the treasury and opposition benches on Tuesday criticised the government for its repeated failures to contain price spirals of essential commodities.
   The day’s sitting also witnessed a walkout by the main opposition Awami League in protest against a statement of the local government, rural development and cooperatives minister, Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan.
   The leader of the opposition, Sheikh Hasina, demanded of the government to make an announcement by today that it would not increase the price of diesel.
   ‘The government must clearly say it did not increase the price of diesel,’ said Hasina, president of the Awami League, when addressing a press briefing after the walkout.
   She accused the government of maintaining double standards over the price of essential commodities by fixing different prices of diesel for northern and southern districts.
   The finance minister, the LGRD and cooperatives minister and the energy and mineral resources advisor were making contradictory statements on the issue, she said. ‘The energy advisor briefed the media about a Tk 1 hike on the per-litre price but the LGRD minister told the house that there had been no such decision by the government. Who is telling the truth?’
   ‘They will raise the price and tell lies to the house,’ Hasina alleged. ‘We will not allow such fraudulence.’
   ‘It is very unfortunate that people have to pay for the conflict of interests among “commission-hungry” ministers,’ she said.
   Earlier, inside the parliament, Suranjit Sengupta, Mohammad Nasim and Sheikh Fazlul Karim of the Awami League along with the opposition chief whip, Abdus Shahid, strongly protested against the price spiral of essential commodities and the increase in diesel price by one taka in the northern districts.
   ‘The government has violated the constitution by fixing dual prices for northern and southern regions,’ said Nasim.
   In response, Mannan Bhuiyan said the government ‘did not take any decision to raise the fuel price and we do not have any plan to increase it’.
   He also claimed that there was an adequate stock of fertilisers and diesel.
   His statement sparked off boisterous protests from the opposition bench as the AL members stood up and walked out, saying the LGRD minister had made a false statement in the house.
   The shipping minister, Akbar Hossain, came in Mannan Bhuiyan’s support. ‘It is necessary to take approval from the cabinet to raise fuel price,’ he told the house.
   Earlier, during the question-answer session, Nurul Huda, a BNP lawmaker from a Chandpur constituency, said, ‘The prices of essential commodities has been undoubtedly increased.’
   He also suggested that the government should withdraw supplementary taxes and duties to check the price spiral.
   The commerce minister, Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, told the house that the government had taken measures to check the price spiral.
   The speaker, Jamir Uddin Sircar, and the deputy speaker, Akhter Hamid Siddiqui, presided over different sittings on Tuesday.

Gas crisis for industrial units in and around the capital city may run through and beyond next summer, as the government has decided that power plants will get the priority in terms of gas supply, said sources in the government.
   The government does not frequent power failures to embarrass it in the lead-up to the next general elections, they said.
   ‘Power plants always get the priority but the government is extra cautious this year as the elections draw near,’ said a source.
   Such precaution may not help the government avoid the embarrassment altogether, he said. ‘Even if the Power Development Board generates power in its full capacity, there will still be a daily shortfall of about 1,000 megawatts during summer.’
   The board submitted a proposal to Petrobangla during a joint meeting on Monday for an additional supply of around 750 million cubic feet of gas per day in the coming months to keep the power plants at full steam.
   The Energy and Mineral Resources Division on Tuesday asked Petrobangla to ensure the additional supply the board had demanded.
   Eighteen gas-based power plants of the board and independent power plants currently consume around 650mmcfd. Some units of the plants are now offline for overhauling, sources in Petrobangla said.
   As demands peak in summer and these units resume operation, the board will require an additional 750mmcfd. The board currently feeds about 3,300MW to the national grid with a peak-hour shortfall of about 700MW, and plans to generate an addition 600-700MW during summer.
   Petrobangla also has its own supply shortfall to deal with. It currently produces 1,510mmcfd against a peak demand of around 1,600mmcfd. The demand is expected to increase to about 1,650mmcfd during summer.
   ‘If the power board is supplied the additional quantum, the industrial units in and around the city, especially along the Savar-Gazipur belt, will bear the brunt,’ said a source in Petrobangla.
   Petrobangla will, however, have no other options, as the government has made sure that the supply to the power plants must be ensured at any cost, he said.
   Leaders of the Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association on Monday complained to the Energy and Mineral Resources Division that the pressure of gas supplied to industries along the Savar-Gazipur belt was low.
   If gas were supplied in full pressure to Tongi and Ghorashal power plant, which consumes around 140mmcfd, the pressure of gas in the industrial belts would decrease further, said the Petrobangla source.
   The Energy and Mineral Resources Division on Tuesday held a review meeting on the gas situation. that was chaired by its adviser, Mahmudur Rahman.
   The meeting, chaired by the energy and mineral resources advisor, Mahmudur Rahman, was told that the total capacity of Petrobangla to supply gas would be around 1600mmcfd by June as around 50mmcfd was expected from Bangura and 300mmcfd from Titas.
   The meeting was also told that although the power board had demanded around 750mmcfd, it would not be able to utilise the additional quantum of gas, as many of its power units would remain inoperative.
   ‘The PDB usually requests for around 650-750mmcfd this time of the year,’ said a source present in the meeting. ‘However, it cannot take the required gas as many of units remain inoperative.’
   He hoped that there would be no gas crisis in and around the city, as the power board might not require the additional 750mmcfd of gas.

The government is likely to backtrack today on its decision to charge consumers in northern districts an additional Tk 0.5-1 for every litre of fuel they buy for the next 15 days.
   It decided on Monday that the Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation would supply fuel to the northern districts by road as navigation in the river Jamuna had proved problematic in the past few days.
   It also decided that dealers would charge an additional Tk 0.5-1 on every litre of fuel from consumers, since the change in mode of transport would translate into additional cost.
   The Energy and Mineral Resources Division now plans to request the home ministry for deployment of the Rapid Action Battalion to contain ‘an artificial fuel crisis across the country’.
   Meanwhile, the petroleum corporation will bear the additional transport cost, said the energy and mineral resources adviser, Mahmudur Rahman, when talking to New Age Tuesday night.
   Mahmud will meet BPC officials and fuel dealers, and high officials of the home ministry, the Bangladesh Rifles, the battalion and the police today.
   ‘We make the decision in the interest of the consumers,’ he said. ‘Although the BPC incurs around Tk 2,500 crore in annual loss by giving subsidy on fuel, it will have to count further losses because of the additional transport costs.’
   Mahmud said there could be a request for RAB deployment to tackle the ‘artificial fuel crisis’ during his meeting with law enforcers.
   ‘We have sufficient supply of fuel; but surprisingly crisis remains in the northern districts,’ he said. ‘I also believe smuggling of fuel has also increased.’
   Mahmud said he would also request the Bangladesh Rifles to increase vigilance along the border to check fuel smuggling.
   Earlier on Tuesday, oil tanker owners and petroleum distributors chalked out different rates of transportation costs for carrying fuel by road to the northern districts over the next 15 days.
   According to their estimates, consumers in Pabna will have to pay an additional Tk 0.65 on every litre of fuel, if the supply is from Daulatpur in Khulna.
   Consumers will pay an additional Tk 0.80-0.85 in Rajshahi, Tk 0.90 in Bogra, Tk 1 in Rangpur, and more than Tk 1 in Thakurgaon and Panchagarh, said Syed Sazzadul Karim
   Kabul, secretary general of the Tank Lorry Owners and Petroleum Distributors’ Association, at a press conference on Tuesday.
   The crisis of petroleum fuels, particularly diesel, prevails in the northern region, as fuel supply is being disrupted for the lack of navigability in the river Jamuna, he said.
   But the government’s decision to supply fuel from depots in Khulna and Dhaka will resolve the problem within a few days when the additional supply reaches the crisis-ridden areas, the distributors added.
   They said frequent power outages in recent times had also caused increased consumption of diesel as farmers run their irrigation pumps with it.
   The distributors demanded that the administrative mechanism should be strengthened to tackle the fuel crisis in the northern region and suggested deployment of army and RAB personnel at depots to ensure smooth supply.

More than 100 suspicious transactions were made through 20 local and foreign commercial banks between mid-2002 and December 2005, according to a report of the Bangladesh Bank.
   The report, recently sent to the finance ministry, contains the names of the banks but does not specify the volume of the transactions.
   ‘The amount could be more than Tk 100 crore or just Tk 1 crore,’ said a high official of the central bank when talking to New Age.
   ‘The amount is not a major concern. We are more concerned with finalising a legal and administrative mechanism to deal with the menace, as the existing system of investigation is ineffective,’ he said.
   Officials in the finance ministry suspect that terrorists, black money holders and hundi operators may have been involved in the transactions.
   The transactions were made through Standard Chartered Bank, Trust Bank, Islami Bank Bangladesh, Pubali Bank, Janata Bank, United Commercial Bank, Standard Bank, National Credit and Commerce Bank, Bank Asia, IFIC Bank, HSBC, BRAC Bank, Agrani Bank, National Bank, Uttara Bank, Arab Bangladesh Bank, One Bank, Shahjalal Islami Bank and Prime Bank, according to the report.
   Standard Chartered tops the list with 37 such transactions, followed by Pubali Bank 32, AB Bank 26 and Janata Bank 9.
   Regulations require commercial banks to inform the central bank of any transaction they deem suspicious based on the financial strength of the account holders concerned.
   ‘People involved in terrorism or fundamentalist movement may have connections with the transactions,’ said the central bank official.
   The Criminal Investigation Department of the police have investigated about 40 of the suspected transactions, said sources in the central bank.
   The investigations returned no satisfactory results, as the department did not have required expertise or experience in detecting financial crimes, added the sources.
   The Anti-Corruption Commission was also approached but declined to deal with the cases, said SM Abul Kashem, general manager of the anti-money laundering department at the central bank.
   ‘We have sent a proposal to the finance ministry for the formation of a cell at the CID to deal with financial crimes, especially terrorist financing and suspicious transactions,’ he told New Age. ‘It has been proposed that the cell should comprise officials from the central bank, the National Board of Revenue and the police.’
   Sources in the finance ministry said a draft bill seeking anti-money laundering and terrorist financing legislations would soon be sent to the cabinet for approval.
   ‘Once the law takes effect there will no longer be any suspicious transaction,’ said a ministry high official.
   The draft bill proposes that a financial crimes investigation and prosecution office should be established under the central bank.
   It will collect statements on suspicious transactions from banks and other financial institutions from time to time and be empowered to file cases with the anti-money laundering and terrorist financing court, which the bill also proposes.
   In 2004 the central bank initially found 204 transactions to be suspicious, says the report. The number was shortened to 101 upon investigation.

The Awami League-led opposition alliance has called a countrywide dawn-to-dusk hartal today (Wednesday) in protest against the price hike of essential commodities, fuel and fertilisers and to push reforms of the caretaker government and electoral system.
   The Awami League president, Sheikh Hasina, also the leader of the opposition in parliament, announced the shutdown from a mass rally at Paltan Maidan on February 5 at the end of a long march to Dhaka.
   Meanwhile, at least 50 people, including lawmen, were injured when pro-hartal demonstrators went on a rampage following a bomb attack on them allegedly by the ruling BNP supporters in Shaheb Bazaar area of northern Rajshahi city on Tuesday.
   Our Rajshahi correspondent reports: The violence erupted at around 5pm, when a group of BNP activists hurled cocktails at a procession of the 14-party combine in Sonadighi area of the city.
   The opposition demonstrators turned violent after the attack and went on a rampage torching a number of vehicles and shops, police and witnesses said.
   They damaged a number of private cars, banks and shops housed in buildings owned by BNP men.
   Soon police and other lawmen along with the BNP supporters appeared at the spot and pounced on the opposition demonstrators triggering pitched battles which left at least 50 people, including some policemen, injured.
   Police fired around 50 tear gas shells and rubber bullets to bring the situation under control.
   Police rounded up 20 persons, mostly onlookers, from the area.
   Secretary of local Jubo League, Habibur Rahman Babu, Chhatra League city vice president Alauddin Ali, BCL workers Zafar, Milon, Khokon,
   Sumon, Dulal, Laltu and Zahid were among those critically injured in the clash.
   The officer-in-charge of Boalia police station Aslam Iqbal, sub-inspector Manju and six constables were also injured.
   Meanwhile, The Islamic Front of Bangladesh expressed its solidarity with the hartal called by the 14-party combine.
   The front leaders took the decision at a meeting at its central office at South Shajahanpur on Tuesday morning with Allama Sayed Bahadur Shah in the chair.
   Earlier, the leaders in a meeting on Monday with the Awami League president Sheikh Hasina at her Sudha Sadhan residence expressed their solidarity with the ongoing movement of the opposition on specific issues and decided to take part in the movement simultaneously under its own party banner.
   The AL general secretary, Abdul Jalil, also co-ordinator of the 14- party combine, has urged the people from all strata to make today’s countrywide hartal a success.
   A meeting of the opposition combine at the Workers Party central office on Tuesday decided to embark on countrywide mass contact to rally support for its demand for reform in the caretaker government and Election Commission to ensure credible polls.
   The combine will hold a rally at Muktangan in the city on February 27, to register protest at the price hikes of fuel.
   The Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal led by its president Hasanul Haq Inu brought out procession and held rally in the capital on Tuesday in support of today’s shutdown.
   Workers Party president Rashed Khan Menon and general secretary Bimal Biswas in a press statement condemned the attack on the procession of the 14-party alliance in Rajshahi and urged the people to make the hartal a success.

The prime minister, Khaleda Zia, on Tuesday sought strategic business partnership with Pakistani entrepreneurs in potential sectors, including textiles, and boost bilateral trade to $ 1 billion by the next year.
   ‘Despite our fraternal relations, our two countries are yet to tap the full potential of economic cooperation… we agree on the need for further increase in trade and investment. We are also aware of the huge potential… only thing we need to do now is to swing into action on the basis of a realistic plan,’ she said at a reception hosted by the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry at Hotel Serena.
   The FPCCI president, Chaudhry Muhammad Saeed, and FBCCI president, Mir Nasir Hossain, also spoke on the occasion.
   A memorandum of understanding between the FPCCI and the FBCCI was also signed during the function to enhance cooperation between the apex trade bodies of the two countries.
   The two chamber presidents signed the agreement for their respective sides in presence of Khaleda and her three cabinet colleagues as well as Pakistani minister for social welfare and special education, Jobayda Jamal.
   Khaleda said Bangladesh had a large market for composite textile mills to meet the growing demand of fabrics for the country’s vibrant industry.
   Mentioning Dhaka’s duty-free market access to EU, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Norway, she said Pakistani entrepreneurs could take advantage of this by setting up industries in Bangladesh, either independently or in joint venture.
   ‘Pakistani entrepreneurs can join hands with their Bangladeshi counterparts, and together they can secure a good share of the global apparel market. Together, they may also develop global brands of garments. I would urge you to look into these prospects seriously,’ she said.
   On the government’s new policy regime and new institutional support, the prime minister said FDI flow in Bangladesh was encouraging and the macro-economic indicators were showing positive signs.
   Saying that Bangladesh government offers attractive incentives for overseas businessmen, she hoped that the business houses from brotherly Pakistan would avail this opportunity.
   On the two-way trade which she said was rather modest, Khaleda suggested concerted efforts to take it to a respectable level and hoped that target of $ 1 in bilateral trade, set by the Bangladesh-Pakistan Joint Economic Commission could be reached by 2007 with full commitment of all concerned.
   Recognising the private sector as the prime mover of economic development, she said SAARC Chamber of Commerce and Industries could also play a pro-active role in promoting trade and commerce, and act as a catalyst between the private sectors and the national governments of the countries in the region.
   The prime minister hoped to see an active Joint Business Council between the apex chambers of Bangladesh and Pakistan– FBCCI and FPCCI. This forum will no doubt contribute immensely to the promotion of bilateral trade, she said.
   Khaleda Zia, current SAARC chairperson, said SAARC member states also focused on economic cooperation. She expressed the optimism that decisions taken at the 13th SAARC summit in Dhaka would be implemented without wasting time for the prosperity of the teeming millions of South Asia.
   Addressing the function, the FPCCI president said the two countries had the potentials of joint venture investment and trade while Bangladeshi products had a good market potential in Pakistan.
   The Bangladesh business delegation has urged Islamabad to ease visa rules for business people from Dhaka.
   A 35-member business delegation of Bangladesh made the request to the Pakistani minister for textile industry, Mushtaq Ali Cheema, during talks on Monday.
   Both sides during the meeting discussed a wide range of issues to promote bilateral trade between the two nations.

The Commonwealth chief, Don Mckinnon, said Tuesday that general Pervez Musharraf must give up either the presidency or control over Pakistan’s armed forces by 2007, when his current presidential term ends.
   McKinnon, secretary-general of the 53-nation club of mainly former British colonies, said Pakistan has made great strides towards democracy but much ‘more progress’ was needed.
   ‘We particularly want you (Musharraf) to deal with this issue of the uniform,’ McKinnon told AFP.
   Commonwealth officials said McKinnon was expected to meet with Musharraf in Pakistan as part of his South Asia tour this week that also includes Bangladesh.
   The Commonwealth suspended Pakistan in 1999 after Musharraf seized power in an army-backed coup but was reinstated in 2004 after he promised to give up his dual role by the end of that year.
   He reneged on the pledge and Pakistan’s parliament passed a law allowing him to remain as president and army chief until 2007. He said he needed to keep both jobs to fight terrorism.
   McKinnon said here that Commonwealth ministers would decide what action to take if Musharraf failed to give up the dual role after general elections expected in October 2007.
   He said Commonwealth ministers ‘clearly would not be happy’ although there was ‘no desire to re-suspend Pakistan’ if he retained both roles.
   ‘There is a desire to help them really construct a viable democracy, build those democratic institutions’ (like Parliament), he said.
   The Commonwealth has been giving technical assistance to Pakistan to help it shift to a democracy and the country has ‘done a lot of useful things’ toward achieving that aim, he said.
   ‘I think they have moved a long way,’ he said.
   He said the Pakistan parliament was now a ‘functioning body’ that has become more representative of the country’s population.
   ‘They have more women, they are getting more minority groups represented.’
   ‘We, like everyone else, can see that Pakistan in the years since independence has a very chequered ... military career,’ McKinnon said.
   Pakistan has been under military dictatorship for around half of its nearly six-decade history.

An application for stay on Monday’s High Court injunction, which barred the Dhaka divisional special judge Rezaul Karim Khan Chunnu from discharging judicial functions for two weeks, was on Tuesday referred to the full bench of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court for a hearing on Thursday.
   The chamber judge, Amirul Kabir Chowdhury, appeared reluctant to entertain the application from Chunnu, according to lawyers who were present in his chamber. He refused to stay the injunction order and referred the application to the full bench of the Appellate Division.
   A sizeable number of the ruling BNP-backed lawyers, including government pleaders and public prosecutors of lower courts, who do not have Appellate Division enrolment, crowded the chamber court when the application was submitted, said sources in the court.
   As the counsel for Khairul Alam Pipul, whose writ petition brought about the injunction order, drew the chamber judge’s attention to the crowd, he ordered them to leave the courtroom, added the sources.
   Abdul Baset Majumder, Mahbubey Alam, M Enayetur Rahim and Abdul Matin Khasru appeared for Pipul while TH Khan with Nitai Roy moved the application for Chunnu.
   The High Court on Monday issued the injunction against Chunnu and also issued a rule on the government to explain why it should not be directed to take immediate actions as per law against the divisional special judge for misconduct because of his alleged involvement in political activities, including his desire to contest the next parliamentary elections on the ruling party ticket.
   The order came in response to a public-interest-litigation writ, which Pipul, a lawyer of the Supreme Court, filed challenging the ‘inaction of the government’ in taking steps against Chunnu.

Ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein on Tuesday told the court trying him on charges of crimes against humanity that he and his co-defendants have launched a hunger strike.
   ‘We have been on a hunger strike for three days,’ Saddam declared as the trial resumed for its 12th hearing since its opened in October. ‘Long live the great Arab nation’ and ‘long live the mujahideen,’ he shouted.
   Saddam’s fellow defendant and half brother Barzan al-Tikriti said he had been on hunger strike for two days. After a raucous session, the trial was adjourned until February 28.
   On Sunday, a member of Saddam’s defence team, who are boycotting the trial, said the defendants were on hunger strike but then retracted their statement.
   The start of the hearing was again marked by heated exchanges between defendants and presiding judge Rauf Abdel Rahman, who has taken a tough line since taking over the trial after his predecessor resigned in January.
   ‘You kick out our lawyers, you bring in witnesses by force and those that testify against us are anonymous—is there a trial like this anywhere else in the world,’ shouted former vice president Taha Yassin Ramadan.
   As the judge pounded his gavel to restore order, Saddam told him to ‘take that hammer and knock yourself on the head.’
   After further arguments, the judge finally called the first witness, an anonymous former member of the intelligence services.
   The man testified from behind a screen about the events surrounding the massacre of Shiites from the village of Dujail in the 1980s for which Saddam and his seven co-accused have been charged.
   ‘It’s like a TV serial, it has to continue,’ said Saddam contemptuously from the dock.
   The anonymous witness claimed he had only been a minor official in the intelligence service at the time of Dujail and knew nothing of events, adding that he had been forced to testify.
   During cross examination, Barzan insisted on calling the witness by his name, and laid out what appeared to be the basis of his defence.
   He said as head of the intelligence service, he was concerned with foreign issues rather than domestic security and the Dujail case was entirely handled by the now deceased head of general security.
   Barzan said he only travelled to Dujail to check on the investigation in fear they might apprehend some suspects unjustly and while he was there he freed some people.
   When the judge tried to cut short Barzan’s long speech, he asked the judge, ‘Why are you always so angry? You are like a train with a full head of steam’.
   The next witness, Fadel Selfij al-Azzawi, was also a member of the intelligence service and a former ambassador to Moscow. Like the previous witness he said he had no knowledge of the case and was testifying against his will.
   He claimed he was out of Iraq at the time of the events and distanced himself from an earlier signed testimony he had given the investigating judge Raed al-Juhi.
   ‘He wrote the statement and I just signed it,’ said al-Azzawi. ‘I didn’t have my glasses when I signed it.’

A mild tremor Tuesday morning shook large swathes of the north and the east of Bangladesh. But no casualties or damage were reported.
   Parts of northern Dinajpur, Rajshahi, Thakurgaon and Nilphamari and eastern Chittagong and Sylhet were jolted by the tremor, according to New Age correspondents.
   New Age Rangpur correspondent reports: A mild tremor was felt in the district and other adjoining districts at about 6:55am. The tremor lasted seven seconds panicking people.
   The magnitude of the tremor, however, could not be measured as there is no seismograph in Rangpur that lies on the most tremor prone zone.
   Reports from other districts also say mild tremors were felt for few seconds.
   Local people said water overflowed ponds and other water bodies when the tremor shook the areas.
   A moderate tremor, measuring 5.9 in the Richter scale, also jolted Chittagong and its adjoining areas.
   Seismological observatory sources said the duration of the primary and secondary wave was one minute and three seconds while its magnitude was moderate in nature.
   But the city dwellers hardly felt the tremor as its epicentre was 619 kilometres from Chittagong.
   Our Sylhet correspondent reports: A mild tremor was felt in Sylhet early Tuesday, but there were no casualties.

The investigation of the simultaneous bomb blasts at four cinemas in Mymensingh took a new turn as an activist of the banned Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh admitted militants’ involvement in the incidents.
   Immediately after the blast in 2002, the government pointed its finger at the opposition Awami League leaders and the lawmen arrested many Awami League leaders, writers and newsmen.
   The activist, Moinul Islam, arrested while exploding a bomb in Tangail much before the August 17 countrywide blasts in 2005, in his statement in a Mymensingh court on Monday said the outfit, under the supervision of its Mymensingh commander Salahuddin Salehin, carried out the attacks in cinemas on December 7, just a day after Eid-ul-Fitr.
   At least 20 people were killed and many others became crippled in the blasts at Purabi, Ajanta, Chhayabani and Aloka cinemas.
   The Mymensingh unit Awami League president, Matiur Rahman, told New Age on Tuesday that the government had implicated him in the case out of political vengeance.
   ‘I told the police and others in the joint interrogation cell that I was arrested on political grounds and I was in no way involved with such an act,’ the Awami League leader said.
   ‘Now the confession of the JMB activist has showed who the culprits were and the government should bring them to justice,’ he said. Another JMB activist, detained in Gazipur, also hinted at the outfit’s link with the cinema blasts, he said.
   A day after the attack, the prime minister, Khaleda Zia, visited Mymensingh and pointed finger at the opposition, he said.
   Narrating his sufferings and torture in custody, Matiur, also a freedom fighter, said he would file a defamation suit against it.
   Apart from Matiur Rahman and the Awami League chief’s political secretary Saber Hossain Chowdhury, the police arrested writers Muntassir Mamum and Shahriar Kabir, journalist Enamul Hoque Chowdhury, and Awami League presidium member Tofail Ahmed on arrival at Zia International Airport from Singapore.
   Saber, Enam and Matiur Rahman were implicated in the cases; Mamun and Shahriar were charged with sedition.
   Shahriar said on Tuesday the government had implicated him and Muntassir Mamun in sedition cases as a High Court bench outright rejected a government plea to implicate Mamun in the blast case.
   ‘Although we were released on bail, we appeared in court regularly as the investigation of the case is yet to be completed,’ he said.
   ‘I have written in my column in the past about the involvement of Jamaatul Mujahideen in the bomb blasts, but the government did not pay heed to it. Now the statement of Moinul and another JMB man had proved my claim,’ Shahriar said.
   ‘The plan was made in the Comilla jail by the militants who were arrested as the members of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami Bangladesh after the attack on poet Shamsur Rahman.’
   Even the government is still reluctant to arrest the JMB militants although its member who was detained in Gazipur in November 2005 hinted at the outfit’s involvement in Mymensingh blasts, he said.
   The outfit also carried out all the attacks on the cultural organisations in the past, he said.

The government is yet to take action against the persons responsible for the delay in auction of about 3,000 tonnes of urea fertiliser, causing the country to incur a loss of over Tk 15 crore.
   The home ministry and the National Board of Revenue are exchanging letters in this regard even five months after a high-profile inquiry committee held the customs personnel responsible for the huge loss.
   The urea, seized in different anti-smuggling drives in 2004, has been rotting in boats on the Karnaphuli River due to the negligence of customs officials and lack of coordination in their activities, said the committee.
   The home ministry formed the committee to find out the persons responsible for the long delay in auctioning the urea. Repeated exhortations by the home ministry to sell the urea as soon as possible produced no result.
   The committee, headed by Chittagong’s divisional commissioner, Md Ashraful Moqbul, submitted its report to the home secretary on September 16, 2005.
   On October 8, 2005 the ministry sent a letter to the NBR to take action against the employees and officials responsible for delaying the auction of the urea. Strangely, it took two months to respond to the letter.
   The NBR, however, on December 13, 2005 wrote to the home ministry to send a copy of the inquiry committee’s report. Surprisingly, the ministry is yet to send the report to the NBR.
   ‘We have almost completed the official procedure and will send the committee’s report to the NBR in a day or two,’ a home ministry official told New Age on Monday.
   Though urea is a semi-perishable good, the customs officials did not take any initiative to sell it on an emergency basis, says the report, adding, ‘The customs officials delayed the process that created scope for opportunists to appear and claim the seized boats and urea.’
   The anti-smuggling units of Bangladesh Navy on July 29, 2004 seized six boats loaded with 23,000 sacks of urea fertiliser worth about Tk 59.5 lakh and handed them over to the customs authority a few days after.
   Sixteen other boats loaded with urea that was being smuggled to India and Myanmar were also seized in that period. The customs could arrange auction of only six boats and urea, but the rest of the urea-loaded boats remained moored near the Marine Academy.
   The committee also found that the concerned police officer’s investigation of the case was of a questionable nature.

Two people were shot dead Tuesday and several others were wounded during protests over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in the eastern Pakistan city of Lahore, the interior minister and police said, AFP reports.
   The demonstrators were killed by a private security guard as they tried to set fire to a bank amid angry demonstrations by thousands of Muslims, interior minister Aftab Sherpao said.
   ‘The gunman of the Metropolitan bank opened fire and two people died. It is a serious development. We are grieved over the loss of precious life,’ Sherpao told private GEO television.
   Police confirmed the deaths, with city police chief Omar Bhatti telling AFP several others were ‘wounded in stone throwing’.
   Protesters enraged by the cartoons that were first published in a Danish newspaper in September also attacked McDonald's and Pizza Hut restaurants and the Holiday Inn hotel, an AFP correspondent said.
   The protests in the historic city came hours after hundreds of students stormed the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad, where they were forced back by police using tear gas and water cannon.
   A Reuters report said that the Pakistani police fired tear gas on Tuesday to disperse hundreds of students who entered Islamabad’s diplomatic enclave to protest against the publication of cartoons.
   The students were driven out after reaching the Indian High Commission, which is next to the British High Commission. They smashed windows of cars and of British bank Standard Chartered.
   The students, who numbered 300-400, shouted slogans including ‘Death to Denmark’ and ‘Expel European ambassadors’.
   Before entering the enclave, they tore down portraits of Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf and visiting Bangladeshi prime minister Khaleda Zia, shouting ‘Traitors, Traitors’.
   The diplomatic enclave is home to many European embassies as well as that of the United States, but not that of Denmark. It is fenced and barricaded and guarded by armed police.
   Police did not attempt to stop the students at the entrance of the enclave, but fired tear gas when they were several hundred metres inside and reached the Indian mission.
   Water cannons were also used to disperse students protesting on the main road outside the enclave where the foreign office and French embassy are located.
   A spokesman for the heavily fortified Indian High Commission appeared unaware of the protest: ‘It’s fine here. There’s no problem here,’ he said.
   Meanwhile, the European Commission president, Jose Manuel Barroso, defended Denmark on Tuesday in the Mohammed cartoons row, telling the Danish media that freedom of expression was ‘not negotiable’.
   ‘Freedom of expression is not something that we can negotiate, because it is an essential value in our open and democratic European society,’ Barroso was quoted as saying in Tuesday’s edition of the Danish daily Berlingske Tidende.
   Barroso said he understood ‘that these drawings made a lot of Muslims in the world uncomfortable and angry.’
   ‘But I want to say at the same time that the principle of non-violence and freedom of expression is decisive for democracy,’ he added.

The police are yet to arrest the Rajshahi University Islami Chhatra Shibir president, Mahbub Alam Salehi, a day after the home ministry gave directives in this regard.
   Meanwhile, the Taher killing case had been shifted to the Detective Branch of police from the Motihar police on Monday.
   The Rajshahi police commissioner, Nayeem Ahmed, told New Age on Tuesday that the police were trying hard to pick up Salehi. He could be arrested within a couple of days for his alleged involvement in the killing, the commissioner said.
   Salehi went into hiding after getting information about his arrest, the police sources said adding that the police planned to arrest him from the February 10 Shaheb Bazar rally, but they did not pick him up in fear of eruption of violence.
   Salehi, a master’s student of geology and mining, used to keep close connection with his department teacher Mian Mohammad Mahiuddin who was arrested in connection with the killing of his colleague. The police also collected some photos of Salehi and Mahiuddin as evidence.
   Before the arrest of Mahiuddin, Salehi was seen very close to him while taking part in the rallies on the campus.
   A police source said Salehi also requested Taher to help for the promotion of Mahiuddin few months back, but he rejected it directly. Besides, Salehi had a keen desire for first class in the master’s examination, but Taher was one of the barriers.
   The police said Mahiuddin also wanted to present a computer to the prime suspect Jahangir for the killing of Taher as he had much interest in computer.
   Meanwhile, the teachers’ association at a Monday night meeting decided to hold human chains on the campus every Saturday demanding immediate trial of the killers of Taher.

The main opposition BJP on Tuesday virtually endorsed the government's vote against Iran at the IAEA meeting saying it was not in India's interest to have another nuclear neighbour in its vicinity.
   But the party attacked the government for the 'impression' that it has surrendered its sovereign rights to take decisions on key issues and ‘permitted to be hustled and pressurised into voting in a particular manner’.
   A statement after a meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Party executive, chaired by former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, which discussed the issue, stopped short of coming out in open support of the Indian vote at the IAEA saying it was not in India's interests to see Iran acquiring nuclear weapons.
   ‘India can clearly neither ignore, nor minimise the strategic implications and adverse consequences of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons. It was therefore patently in India's interests to have been in the forefront of that vast majority of the international community questioning the many clandestine devices through which nuclear technology and material have been transferred to Iran from Pakistan and several other countries.
   ‘These acquisitions are in clear violation of the obligations, and commitments under the Non-Proliferation Treaty plus all related safeguard provisions of it’, the party said.
   Later, briefing reporters, leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha Jaswant Singh said, ‘the BJP is clear that it was not in national interests to have another nuclear weapon power in its neighbourhood but the casual manner in which it treated the issue raises doubts that the arrival of the conclusion was determined by the government at the prodding and pushing upon some consideration.’
   Besides Vajpayee and Jaswant Singh, the BJP meeting was attended by leader of opposition in Lok Sabha LK Advani and other senior leaders including M Venkaiah Naidu, Sushma Swaraj, Pramod Mahajan and V K Malhotra.
   ‘The government and its allies the Communists are responsible for the shoddy state of affairs. Statements coming out of the US Congress, other decision makers in the US, and the US ambassador to Delhi threatening India, have heightened suspicion that the US wishes to establish a hegemonistic relationship with India, not that of two sovereign equals’, BJP said.
   Maintaining that India's votes at IAEA and statements from US ‘raised apprehensions’ about yet another demonstration of ‘unacceptable unilateralism’ in the region, it said, ‘the BJP rejects this theory of unilateral actions outside the UN aegis’.

One of the suspected robbers was killed in an encounter with the Rapid Action Battalion at Saral under Banskhali upazila in the district Monday night.
   The battalion members also seized two SBBL guns, three light guns, one rifle, and 13 cartridges from the place and arrested 14 robbers.
   The deceased was identified as Zamir Uddin, 35, while the arrested robbers were Mohammad Kamal, 25, Azizur Rahman, 47, Jafar Ahmed, 48, Ali Ahmed, 35, Safiqur Rahman, 24, Mahfuz Mian, 50, Monir Ahmed, 35, Mahmudul Islam, 18, Mohammad Idrish, 36, Nurul Kader, 22, Nabi Alam, 24, Fazal Kabir, 18, Mohammad Salim, 15, and Ahmed Ullah, 35. All of them came from Saral.
   The battalion sources said as a RAB-7 team, upon secret information, reached the area to carry out a raid on the house of one Kala Miah at about 8:00pm, the robbers suddenly opened fire on the elite force who reiterated by firing resulting in a gunfight.
   The battalion members later recovered the body of bullet-riddled Zamir, and the arms following the three-hour gunfight.
   The other robbers took shelter on the ceiling of the house from where the battalion members arrested them and handed them over to the police with the firearms.

The killing of a Secondary School Certificate examinee at Noakati village under Dumuria upazila of the district sparked off demonstrations in the upazila on Tuesday.
   The teachers and students of Sahas Noakati School went out on demonstrations in the upazila headquarters in protest against the killing of Rahima Sulatna, 16, daughter of Sabar Uddin Sheikh, and demanding the arrest of the killers.
   Rahima, a student of the school, was strangulated to death after rape allegedly by her sister’s husband at her residence on Monday evening.
   The police and the family members said Rahima’s mother went out of the house at noon. After returning to house in the evening, she found that the door was locked. Later she with the help of local people broke open the door and found her daughter dead.
   Rahima’s mother Rizia Begum alleged that Mannan, husband of her elder daughter, used to disturb her younger daughter and killed her after rape.
   Mannan’s wife Salma Begum also alleged that her husband used to disturb her sister and might kill her.
   A case was filed with the Dumuria police station on Tuesday against four persons including Mannan. But the police failed to arrest anyone.

Iran said Tuesday that the fatwa or religious edict condemning British author Salman Rushdie to death over his novel ‘The Satanic Verses’ will remain in force forever.
   The announcement was made on the anniversary of the 1989 edict issued by the leader of Iran’s Islamic revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and comes amid global Muslim outrage over cartoons denigrating the Prophet Mohammed.
   ‘Imam Khomeini’s fatwa on the apostate Salman Rushdie will remain in force for eternity,’ said the Martyrs Foundation, which has offered a bounty 2.8 millon dollar bounty for Rushdie’s head.
   The novelist, born in 1947 in Bombay, India, to a Muslim family, sparked fury from Muslims worldwide because of alleged blasphemy and apostasy in the novel.
   ‘I inform the proud Muslim people of the world that the author of the Satanic Verses book which is against Islam, the Prophet and the Koran, and all involved in its publication who were aware of its content, are sentenced to death,’ the ayatollah said in the fatwa.
   Rushdie, who won Britain’s Booker Prize in 1981 with his second novel ‘Midnight’s Children’ spent several years in hiding after the fatwa was issued.

Hardline Hindu groups and radical Muslims burned Valentine's Day greeting cards on Tuesday and held protests across India against celebrating the festival of love, saying it was a Western import that spread immorality.
   Saint Valentine's Day has become increasingly popular in India in recent years, a trend led by retailers who do healthy business selling heart-shaped balloons and fluffy teddy bears.
   But the growing popularity of the day in officially secular, but mainly Hindu India has also sparked protests which have sometimes turned violent.
   On Tuesday, protests were held in the capital New Delhi, some towns in the country's south and the only Muslim state of Jammu and Kashmir, where an Islamic insurgency has raged since 1989.
   About two dozen women separatists, veiled in black from head to toe, rummaged shops and burnt Valentine's Day cards in Srinagar, Kashmir's summer capital, witnesses said.
   ‘Valentine's Day spreads immorality among the youth,’ Asiya Andrabi of the Dukhtaran-e-Milat (Daughters of the Muslim Faith), a group of women separatists, said in a statement.
   ‘We appeal to our children to stay away from this western culture.’
   In Bangalore, India's technology capital, as well as Hubli town, groups of Hindu nationalists burnt a big heart-shaped card.

The combine of 14 opposition political parties led by the Awami League has decided to embark on massive campaigns to make its scheduled grand rally in the port city on March 1 a success drawing a huge crowd.
   Local leaders of the 14-party combine said they had taken the decision to hold the rally to push the oppositions’ demand for reforms of electoral system and caretaker government.
   The leader of the opposition Sheikh Hasina is expected to address the rally as chief guest, party sources said.
   The local unit of the alliance will start campaign soon to rally support for its demands and make the public meeting, to be held at the outer stadium, a grand success, they added.
   Local leaders of the 14-party combine are expected to hold a preparatory meeting here next Saturday for the grand rally.
   A leader of Chittagong city unit of the AL Khorshed Alam Sujan told New Age the opposition was hoping to gather some five lakh people from the entire Chittagong division at the March 1 rally.
   ‘Arrangements will be made to facilitate the arrival of party supporters and activists at the grand rally as we are determined to make it a complete success’, he said adding ‘we will launch a massive publicity campaign here soon for the purpose’.
   Senior leaders of the alliance partners are also expected to arrive from Dhaka to attend the rally, they added.
   Administration sources said special security measures would be taken in and around the venue during the rally to ensure law and order.
   Earlier, the grand rally was scheduled to be held here on January 30, but it was later shifted to March 1, party sources said.
   The ruling BNP also organised a mass rally here at the outer stadium on February 2 in an apparent show of strength.

The ferry movement on the River Karnaphuli from the Firingi Bazar Bridge terminal was suspended for an indefinite period from Tuesday.
   A mobile court of the Chittagong Port Authority issued an order in this regard on Monday as the ferries were plying in the river without valid document and the captains were lacking in skills.
   Meanwhile, the court had fined a captain with Tk 20,000 for plying the ferry without report on survey, and Tk 10,000 for not having certificate relating to the skills.
   The sources said the court also asked the Roads and Highways Department to stop the ferry movement until the procurement of reports and appointment of skilled captains.
   A ferry Sugandha-28 capsized in the river with 30 passengers and nine trucks shortly after sailing from the terminal on February 5 due to overloading and unskilled driving. Seven bodies were recovered from the river while seven others were still missing.
   The RHD introduced the ferry service on February 18, 2001 as plying of heavy vehicles were prohibited on the Shah Amanat Bridge due to its poor condition.

A hawker, Jaynal Abedin, 45, of Deyana area under Daulatpur in the Khulna city was injured as assailants hurled a bomb at Daulatpur Baby Stand of the city on Tuesday at around 8:15pm.
   The police said the miscreants hurled the bomb while there was no electricity in the area. The bomb exploded with big bang and splinters of the bomb hit the legs of Jaynal, they added.
   Panic gripped the area and the locals took Jaynal to a nearby clinic, the police said.

A freedom fighter, who was wounded in battle during the 1971 war of liberation, was shot dead by unknown assailants at village Majhila near the Islamic University in Kushtia on Monday night.
   The slain freedom fighter was identified as Shafiqul Islam
   Khokon, 55, of the village.
   The police said, Khokon was returning home at around 10.00 pm from a bazaar at Patikabari when a gang of unidentified gunmen waylaid him near Majila Bazaar.
   The assailants shot him in the chest and then hacked him with machete. Khokon died on the spot. Khokon was buried with state honours at the village graveyard on Wednesday. The police could not yet find any motive for the grisly murder.
   The police and locals, however, said he was a supporter of the Awami League. A case was filed with the local thana.

The class III and IV employees of Rajshahi University of Engineering and Technology demonstrated and staged a sit-in programme for an hour on Tuesday in front of the vice chancellor’s office to protest against fresh recruitment of 19 employees and demanded regularisation of previously recruited around 100 employees.
   They protested the decision of RUET authorities of depriving the temporary and muster roll employees.
   The university employee’s union president, Kaikobad called for a general strike in the RUET campus on Thursday, demanding the withdrawal of those 19 appointments.