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Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson Khaleda Zia is ready to sit across the table with her archrival, Awami League president Sheikh Hasina who has welcomed the move but said she will make a decision after she returns home and consults her party leaders.
   A senior Supreme Court lawyer, Rafique-ul Huq, assigned by the interim government to persuade the two top leaders to sit across the table with the government, revealed this on his return from Singapore on Friday.
   ‘I talked with both the top leaders over telephone from Singapore. Both of them welcomed the move. Khaleda Zia told me that she was ready for the dialogue,’ Rafique told New Age on Friday.
   ‘Hasina also welcomed the move and said that she would talk with me on the issue after consulting her party’s leaders on her return from the US,’ said Rafique.
   He said he was hopeful of bringing the two top leaders of the country to the same table.
   He said that he would take the practical initiative after Hasina’s return.
   ‘I cannot go ahead until Sheikh Hasina comes home. In the meantime I may talk with the government and Khaleda Zia. But no practical initiative can be taken before Sheikh Hasina’s return,’ said Rafique.
   Rafique, who is also the chief counsel of the two ‘battling begums’ of Bangladesh, on September 9 first made the calls to Hasina and Khaleda to sit together in the interest of democracy, and stop mud-slinging and feud between the two parties.
   ‘They should sit together in the interest of the country and democracy. They can meet at my place if it is convenient for them,’ Rafique told reporters in his Supreme Court chamber after obtaining bail for Khaleda.
   Later, on September 11, education adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman told reporters that the government would try to sit with the two top leaders across the table.
   When he was asked whether the initiative taken by him was his own or suggested by the government, Rafique replied, ‘It is my own, personal move. As a citizen and the counsel for both the leaders, I told reporters on September 9 that the two top leaders should sit across the table. Later I went to Singapore and two advisers, AF Hassan Ariff and Zillur, talked to me over the telephone and hailed the move.’
   Both the advisers told him that the government wanted to bring the two top leaders to the same table and sought his assistance in this regard, Rafique added.
   Several political parties and even the Awami League have already expressed their reservations about the government’s move to sit with the two leading ladies.
   The Jatiya Party chairman, HM Ershad, while addressing a rally before iftar at a community centre in Jatrabari on Friday, said that the government wanted to bring the two former prime ministers to sit across the table to form a national government, forgoing general elections.
   Rafique, when he was asked whether there was any specific agenda for the proposed dialogue, said, ‘There is no specific agenda. As a citizen, I think enough is enough. There has been enough squabbling. The Awami League and the BNP have to stop this and work together in the interest of the country.’
   ‘The two top leaders do not talk to one another. Such a political culture must be changed. They should work for the nation,’ he added.
   Rafique also mentioned that there might be some other move on behalf of the government to bring Hasina and Khaleda to sit across the table.
   According to him, Hossain Zillur had told him that he might try to talk to Hasina on the issue during his visit to the US.

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its allies, Jamaat-e-Islami and Islami Oikya Jote, will sit with the Election Commission in separate dialogues today to push for their demands, including holding of the national elections first.
   The BNP secretary general, Khandaker Delwar Hossain told New Age that his party would participate in the dialogue and will make the party’s position clear on certain issues.
   The BNP will put emphasis on immediate lifting of the state of emergency, dropping the plan for holding upazila elections before parliamentary polls and cancelling the amendments to the Representation of the People Order 1972 that calls for registration of political parties and incorporates an option of ‘no vote’ in ballot paper. The party will also call for creating an environment conducive to holding the elections.
   Delwar is expected lead a nine-member delegation of BNP comprising standing committee members RA Gani, Chowdhury Tanvir Ahmed Siddiqui and M Shamsul Islam, vice-chairmen MK Anwar and Sarwari Rahman, joint secretaries general Nazrul Islam Khan and Abdul Mannan, and office secretary Rizvi Ahmed.
   Jamaat-e-Islami assistant secretary general Muhammad Qamaruzzman said the party would join the talks this morning.
   The Jamaat senior nayeb-e-amir Maqbul Ahmed will lead the party delegation comprising Muhammad Quamaruzzaman, Abdus Sobhan, Abdul Quader Mollah, Muhibur Rahman, Jasimuddin Sarker and Rafiqul Islam Khan.
   Islami Oikya Jote secretary general Abdul Latif Nezami said his party had accepted the commission’s invitation and would attend the talks today.
   According to the schedule, the commission will sit with the BNP at 11:30am, with the Jamaat-e-Islami at 10:30am and with the Islami Oikya Jote at 2:00pm.
   It will be BNP’s first meeting with the commission which has held three rounds of dialogues with political parties since September 12 last year.
   The Election Commission initiated the latest series of dialogues to discuss the contentious issues relating to parties’ registration as major political parties rejected the October 15 deadline for getting registered in order to qualify for contesting the general elections planned in December.
   The chief election commissioner, ATM Shamsul Huda, on Wednesday said that after wrapping up the dialogues, the commission will simultaneously announce on Monday specific dates for elections to Jatiya Sangsad, Dhaka City Corporation and upazila parishads.
   The commission had earlier set September 8 for dialogues with the BNP and September 9 for Jamaat-e-Islami and Islami Oikya Jote, but the three parties skipped the talks demanding release of BNP chief Khaleda Zia.
   Fresh initiatives for a dialogue with the BNP were taken after Khaleda was released on bail on September 11.
   The commission invited the mainstream of BNP to talks for the first time on August 29, addressing Khandaker Delwar Hossain as the party’s secretary general.
   Before August 29, the commission had recognised the government-backed splinter group of the party and held talks with M Hafizuddin Ahmed, the leader of that group, distancing itself from the party’s mainstream loyal to Khaleda Zia-nominated secretary general, Delwar.
   The commission changed its mind recently and a day after sending the invitation to Delwar, the chief election commissioner at a function in Dhaka regretted the commission’s past dealings with the BNP.
   Bangladesh Jatiya Party, another component of the BNP-led alliance, came down heavily on the Election Commission for not inviting the party to the dialogue though it had four seats in the immediate past parliament.
   The party chairman, Andaleeve Rahman, at a news conference at his home said the commission had ignored them while they had invited some letterhead parties with no representation in parliament.
   ‘The Bangladesh Jatiya Party won four seats in the last parliamentary elections but for a mysterious reasons the Election Commission did not invite us to the dialogue’, Andaleeve said. ‘We will have to guard against such “palace intrigue” against the alliance.’

The academic life of several thousand students in two public universities, four medical colleges, and a polytechnic institution gets seriously hampered because of the closure of the institutions.
   Three of the institutions were closed over clashes between the students and local residents, three over clashes between rival student organisations and the other amid student movement demanding an increase in study tour allowance.
   Tense are the campuses of two more universities as a section students in such places have for long been holding protests to push for their demands.
   About 400 students and common people were injured in clashes at Rajshahi University, Rajshahi Medical College, Ziaur Rahman Medical College in Bogra, Barisal Sher-e-Bangla Medical College, Comilla Medical College and the Sylhet Polytechnic Institute.
   According to authorities, Hajee Mohammad Danesh University of Science and Technology has been closed fearing troubles as the students rallied for six days.
   The authorities of the universities and the medical colleges formed committees to investigate the incidents, but reports are yet to be published.
   Rajshahi University, which was closed for an indefinite period on August 20, will, however, reopen on October 12. The halls will reopen on October 11, according to a syndicate decision.
   The university was closed over clashes between students and local traders in which 60, including teachers, students and policemen, were injured.
   ‘The syndicate decided to resume classes on October 12 and the residence halls will be opened on October 11,’ the Rajshahi University registrar, Muhammad Shafi, said on September 12.
   Sher-e-Bangla Medical College in Barisal was on August 25 closed for an indefinite period. At least 200 students and common people were injured in the series of clashes.
   The authorities closed the medical colleges amid a tense situation prevailing on the campus and surrounding areas after a young man had been reportedly killed by the medical college students.
   The authorities ordered the students to vacate all the five hostels, two of them for female, and postponed all examinations until further order.
   The Sylhet Polytechnic Institute was closed on September 1 for an indefinite period as the situation on the campus became volatile over the August 31 clash between Chhatra Dal and Chhatra Shibir activists. The authorities also asked the students to vacate the residence halls.
   At least 11 students and a superintendent of a residence hall were injured and more than 30 rooms of two halls were vandalised during the clash which continued from August 31 to September 1 night.
   The Rajshahi Medical College was on September 12 closed till October 10 after clashes between Chhatra League and Chhatra Dal activists the day before in which at least 20 students were injured.
   The boarders left the hostels after the authorities asked them to do so by 6:00pm on September 12.
   At least 20 leaders and activists of the college unit Chhatra League, student front the Awami League, and the Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal, student front of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, were injured in the clash at the Shaheed Shah Mainul Ahsan Pinku hostel on the campus.
   According to campus sources, the clash had begun over capturing a seat in Room 205 in the hostel. Later a group of 20 Chhatra Dal activists attacked Chhatra League activists and vandalised their rooms.
   The college principal, Fazlur Rahman, said the authorities had decided to close the institution to stave off further trouble.
   ‘We have decided to close the college till on October 10 to avoid further clashes,’ Fazlur said. ‘Clashes will take place if the college remains open. Classes will resume on October 11.’
   The Shaheed Ziaur Rahman Medical College at Bogra was on August 30 closed for an indefinite period. At least 24 activists of the Chhatra League and Chhatra Shibir and some general students were injured in a clash on August 29.
   According to the authorities of Hajee Mohammad Danesh University of Science and Technology, the institution was closed on September 8 fearing the deterioration in campus situation.
   ‘The students went out on demonstrations demanding an increase in study tour allowance. After six days, the authorities on September 9 closed the institution till October 9,’ said an official.
   In the latest development of the series of closure of higher educational institutions, the Comilla Medical College was on Thursday closed for an indefinite period over a clash between students and local people amid campus unrest.
   The academic council of the college at an emergency meeting decided to close the institution and asked all the resident students to vacate their hostels by Friday noon after the clash in which 10 students were injured. A three-member committee was formed to investigate the incident.
   The University Grants Commission chairman, Nazrul Islam, said the closures would add to the sufferings of the students and the government was trying to reopen the institutions soon.

Transport leaders and workers on Friday threatened to paralyse the sector by launching tougher protest programmes if the administration fails to stop extortion and provide security.
   They also demanded action against the people who shot dead Parvez — a counterman of Shohag Paribahan at Gabtoli Bus Terminal — on September 11, and set October 13 as the deadline for the government to take measures against the extortionists and the killers of Parvez.
   The deadline was announced at a press conference jointly organised by the Bangladesh Sarak Paribahan Sramik Federation and Bangladesh Bus-Truck Owners Association at the National Press Club on Friday afternoon.
   Terming extortion in the transport sector a big national problem, BSPSF’s executive president Shahjahan Khan expressed the hope that the government would take immediate action against the culprits to protect the sector and the transport workers and owners. ‘Otherwise we will have no option but to shut down our businesses,’ he said.
   Shahjahan, also a former lawmaker from the Awami League, said the transport owners regularly need to pay tolls to extortionists, and the traffic police and highway police also take their share, threatening to file cases if they are not paid.
   Sohel Talukdar, owner of Shohag Paribahan, said the Shahadat gang was demanding Tk 1 crore from him over phone.
   He said the gang had also threatened to kill him if he failed to pay the amount.
   Shafiqul Islam, owner of Nabil Paribahan, said the same gang had asked him to pay Tk 50 lakh to ‘Kochi Dada (Shahadat)’ over the phone on September 13.
   As he switched off the mobile phone, they phoned one of company’s ticket counters to demand toll.
   Mentioning some incidents of extortion, the transport owners’ association’s chairman, GM Siraj, said that the whole transport sector has become hostage to the Shahadat gang.
   The leaders of the transport sector also announced a series of protest movements to press home their demands, which includes wearing of black badges on September 20 at Gabtoli terminal, a national convention in the city on September 21 and suspension of vehicular movement from 3-5pm on September 22.

Chicken prices increased further in the city in a week while prices of vegetables, spices and other major food items remained high.
   Salt prices on the retail market remained unchanged in the week after they had increased for two weeks before. Wholesalers said the prices might increase further.
   Broiler prices increased by Tk 10 a kilogram in the week to sell for prices between Tk 120 and Tk 130 on Friday.
   The supply of broiler remained poor as, market people said, growers were looking forward to make windfall profits with only a week and a half before Eid-ul-Fitr.
   ‘Chicken prices will be going up for more than a week before they decline,’ said Abdur Rashid, a chicken seller at the Hatirpool market.
   Some retailers said the prices of day-old chicks had increased in a few weeks.
   Vegetable prices remained somewhat stable or started declining in the week as, according to retailers, the demand declined.
   Potato was retailed between Tk 17 and Tk 18 a kilogram at Nakhalpara on Friday, yard-long bean between Tk 30 and Tk 32, green papaya between Tk 16 and Tk 18, pointed gourd Tk 22 and Tk 24, aubergine between Tk 40 and Tk 50 and green chilli between Tk 40 and Tk 48.
   Onion prices increased again, with different varieties selling for prices between Tk 22 and Tk 34 a kilogram on Friday. Increased supply of Indian onions pushed down, the lowest being Tk 18 from Tk 28 in early Ramadan.
   Finely refined palm oil, which is passed off as non-packed soya beal oil and is known among the traders as super palm, sold for prices between Tk 74 and Tk 80 a kilogram in the week. Bottled soya bean oil sold for prices between Tk 104 and Tk 110 a litre.
   Cooking oil prices had declined over a few weeks as the prices declined on the international market.
   Beef, mutton, eggs and fish prices also remained somewhat stable in the week.
   Coarse rice was retailed between Tk 31 and Tk 34 a kilogram, fine rice between Tk 37 and Tk 44, red lentils between Tk 88 and Tk 108 and sugar between Tk 36 and Tk 38.
   Salt, which marked up by Tk 2 a kilogram in two weeks, was retailed between Tk 15 and Tk 18 a kilogram.
   Market people said salt prices could increase further if the government would not ensure adequate supply of the commodity.
   Some salt traders in Cox’s Bazar and Narayanganj said the demand for salt increased sharply as the textile and chemical processing units increased in recent years.

A frozen embryo baby was born in a city hospital on Friday.
   Salma Begum, wife of banker Afzal Hossain, gave birth to the child in Modern Hospital at Dhanmondi Road 8. The couple, who married about five years ago, greeted the newborn by naming her Apsara, after a mythical character.
   Rashida Begum, an assistant professor of the department of gynaecology and obstetrics at the Dhaka Medical College and also the chief consultant gynaecologist of Infertility Care and Research Centre at Mohammadpur, helped the delivery by Caesarean at 2:10pm. She was assisted by Farzana Khan, Nushrat, Ehsan Kadir and Nafisa.
   Dr Rashida said Apsara was the first baby born in the country by frozen embryo technology.
   The baby weighs 3.2kg and is fine and her mother is also in good health, the physician told the press at the hospital Friday afternoon.
   After the failure of the test-tube technology on September 19, 2007, four frozen embryos were implanted in the ovaries of the woman on January 18, 2008, by which Apsara was born on Friday, Rashida said.
   About the technology, Rashida said that the water-free surplus embryos of test-tube technology were preserved in liquid nitrogen at minus 196 degrees Celsius with a special medium and later adequate embryos were implanted into the ovaries of a mother.
   The birth of Apsara cost Tk 2.65 lakh, including Tk 2 lakh spent on test-tube technology, she said.
   The world’s first embryo baby was born in Queen Victoria Medical Centre in Melbourne, Australia, in 1984 and the first in Asia in National University Hospital in Singapore in 1987.

Bangladeshi authorities have ordered 15 brands of milk powder be tested for the hazardous chemical that has killed four babies in China and sickened thousands more, an official said on Friday.
   The director general of the Bangladesh Standard and Testing Institute, Azmal Hossain, told the news agency that samples of Chinese and New Zealand milk powder brands had been gathered from markets throughout the country.
   ‘We collected the milk on Thursday and will do so again today (Friday). It will then be tested by the department of chemistry at Dhaka University and we will know the results within seven or eight days,’ he said.
   New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra is a joint venture partner of Chinese milk manufacturer Sanlu Group, which has been affected by the product safety scandal in China. Two other Chinese companies found to have produced tainted milk powder, Guangdong-based Yashili Group and Qingdao-based Suncare Co Ltd, export products to Bangladesh.
   ‘We put public health notices in some Bangla-language newspapers Thursday telling people not to consume powder from two Chinese companies,’ Hossain said.
   Officials from Bangladesh’s food and commerce ministries were due to hold a meeting on Sunday to discuss the matter, he added.
   The chemical blamed for the contamination — melamine — can make products look like they are bursting with protein but if consumed in large amounts can be lethal.
   Melamine has been blamed for causing kidney stones in babies, a condition rare for infants but which causes a range of serious health risks.
   Food contamination is common in Bangladesh.
   Anti-adulteration drives by authorities regularly find food contaminated with fertiliser and textile and tannery dyes to improve the presentation of the product or to speed up the ripening of fruit and vegetables.

Absence of a policy to check the unplanned urban expansion has posed a serious threat to the habitat of the country’s two major cities and may gradually affect other metropolises and secondary towns in the near future, warned experts and urban and regional planners.
   ‘If the current rate of unplanned spread of urban areas continues, many of the cities and urban locales will become uninhabitable in a very short time,’ Professor Sarwar Jahan, a teacher of Urban and Regional Planning at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, told New Age on Friday.
   He referred to the concentrated development in the capital and south-eastern Chittagong metropolis, saying that life has become difficult in these cities because of the intense pressure of infrastructure, unplanned construction, slums and informal settlements.
   Dhaka, which has turned into a mega-city of around 15 million people, is riddled with the problems of traffic congestion, water-logging, air and noise pollution, and inadequate supply of civic amenities.
   Nearly one-third of the capital’s population who live in slums are deprived of any facilities like water, power supply and sanitation.
   Such concentrated development causes economic disparity and widens the gap between the poor and rich, said Sarwar, also the dean of the Faculty of Architecture and Planning of BUET.
   Experts also warned that the crammed growth of houses in the two cities has not only become a threat to health and environment but has also turned them into death traps in case of natural disasters like earthquake, mudslide or accidents like fire.
   Bangladesh, a country of over 153 million people, does not have a National Urban Policy even now, though the urban growth rate is around six per cent and 26 per cent of its population live in urban areas, although a move was on to approve the National Urban Policy.
   But the matter seems to have been forgotten.
   When approached for his comment on the proposed policy, the draft of which was prepared by an expert committee in 2006, the local government rural development and cooperatives adviser Anwarul Iqbal expressed his ignorance.
   ‘I’ve no knowledgeable of it,’ regretfully admitted the adviser whose ministry is responsible for preparing such policies.
   The pressure on the urban infrastructure has increased manifold in the last few years. The shrinking economic opportunities in rural areas, disasters and rise of commodity prices has forced a huge section of the rural population to migrate to urban areas in search of their livelihoods, said Mostafa Quaium Khan, the executive director of the Coalition for Urban Poor, a network of over 50 NGOs working for improvement of the lives of the urban poor.
   ‘As we have no policy for urban development, the laws related to urban amenities and infrastructure mostly remain unimplemented,’ he said, adding that weak monitoring causes haphazard construction in almost every town without keeping in mind the basic utility services.
   The establishment of new settlements and construction of buildings are hardly monitored by the so-called regulating authorities in almost all cities and towns. In many cases, the authorities simply pass the plans without taking into consideration the consequences of such development, said an official at the Ministry of Housing and Public Works.
   The percentage of urban population was 8.7 in 1974, which rose to 23.1 per cent in 2001, to 15.18 per cent in 1981 and 19.63 in 1991, according to the latest population census.
   Experts in the BUET said that the percentage is now estimated to be as high as 26.
   The previous government, taking into consideration the swift expansion of urban areas, drafted the policy on urbanisation, suggesting six categories of urban areas according to their hierarchy. They are mega-city (over 8 million people), metropolitan city (.5 million to 8m), regional city (.2 to .5m), secondary city or district towns (.02m to .05), small towns/upazila centre (.02 to .05m), local centre/growth centre/compact town (population less than .02 million).
   The draft suggested capacity building, master planning and detailed area planning; structure and action planning; urban environment; local economic development; resource mobilisation; land management; land use zoning and land development; urban housing and housing for the poor and urban slum improvement. It also underscored the need to address urban poverty; resettle slum dwellers; ensure tenure security and access to infrastructure and services; urban environment management; urban transportation; health and education; social structure, gender concerns; planning for the urban children, aged, disabled, street children and scavengers; recreation, playground, parks and open spaces; cultural and aesthetic development; rural-urban linkages; law and order; urban governance; formation of a national urban development council; and restructuring of the local government ministry.

The Jatiya Party chairman, HM Ershad, thinks the government wants to bring the two former prime ministers across the table to form a national government, forgoing general elections.
   ‘We hear about the meeting between the two leaders. As far as our knowledge goes water and oil don’t mix. So what’s the meeting for?’ the former president said at a rally before iftar at a community centre at Jatrabari in the capital on Friday.
   The Jatrabari, Demra and Shyampur thana units of the party organised the function.
   The former military strongman expressed doubts of general elections. ‘People think the elections will not be held. There will be a national government.’
   Ershad, however, urged the party supporters to get ready for the elections.
   The deposed president announced that he would run the next parliamentary elections from Gulshan constituency.
   ‘Insha Allah (God willing), I’ll contest from Gulshan constituency.’
   ‘I’ve prepared the party for elections. If the upazila elections are held before the national elections we will participate in it.
   ‘I congratulate the present caretaker government on its realising the importance of upazila as a local government institution.’
   Ershad took a swipe at former caretaker government chief and president Justice Shahabuddin Ahmed.
   ‘If Shahabuddin did not betray in 1991 the Jatiya Party would have gone on to win the elections then.’

Awami League presidium member Amir Hossain Amu on Friday protested at the arrest of Juba League general secretary Mirza Azam from the jail gate soon after his release, saying people would not accept the military-controlled government treating political leaders this way.
   The overall law and order situation will slump if the law enforcers continue to abuse law in such a way, Amu warned addressing a rally at the Bangabandhu Avenue central office of the party.
   Awami Juba League, youth front of the Awami League, organised the programme to protest at Azam’s re-arrest minutes after he had been released on bail from the Dhaka Central Jail on Thursday.
   Amu asked the interim government to create an atmosphere conducive to the holding of credible national elections as ‘only announcement’ of polls dates cannot ensure free and fair elections.
   ‘The government has to ensure the release of Sheikh Hasina and other leaders of AL and its front organisations to create an amicable polls environment,’ he said.
   Juba League presidium member Mizanur Rahman presided over the rally, also addressed by its leaders Mojibur Rahman Chowdhury, Harun-or-Rashid, Abdus Sattar Masud, Ataur Rahman and Subrata Pal.

Nearly 10 per cent of milk samples from three top Chinese dairy companies were tainted with melamine, the government quality watchdog found after testing for the banned chemical that has killed four children.
   A nationwide check found melamine contamination in dairy products ran wider than the tainted milk powder that has made thousands of infants ill and sparked a widening scandal.
   The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine pointed its finger at two of China’s top dairy producers, the Xinhua news agency reported late on Thursday.
   Almost one-tenth of liquid milk batches from Mengniu Dairy and Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group Co Ltd contained melamine, a compound banned in food, the agency found.
   Several samples of liquid milk from the Bright dairy group also had the substance, which can be used to bamboozle quality checks.
   Starbucks Corp said its over 300 cafes in mainland China had pulled milk supplied by Mengniu. Starbucks said no employees or customers had fallen ill from the milk.
   The Chinese government has faced panicked parents and public dismay since officials and the Sanlu Group, the nation’s biggest maker of infant milk powder, last week revealed babies were sick with kidney stones and complications from drinking toxic powder.
   At the latest count, 6,244 children have become ill, with four dead and 158 suffering ‘acute kidney failure’.
   The poisonings exposed regulatory failings in the dairy industry that will need more than a blitz of inspections and detentions to cure, said Guan Anping, a former trade official and now a lawyer who has dealt with dairy producers.
   ‘Scattered milk farmers have been at the mercy of milk thugs, local strongmen who control prices and get away with putting all sorts of things in milk to maximise their profits,’ said Guan.
   ‘It started with adding water, but other chemicals are used too, including out-of-date antibiotics to stop the milk going bad on long trips to processors.’
   Melamine is rich in nitrogen, used to measure protein, and so can be used to disguise diluted milk.
   Quality officials stressed that most milk was safe to drink, trying to shore up public trust already shaken by a litany of food scares involving eggs, pork and seafood in recent years.
   The quality watchdog cited experts as saying melamine-tainted milk would not make adults sick unless they drank more than two litres a day.
   Chinese media have largely kept quiet about claims that Sanlu and officials in Shijiazhuang, where the company is based, concealed the poisonings from the public and senior authorities during the Beijing Olympics in August.
   Sanlu is 43 per cent owned by New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra, and New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark said on Monday that Chinese officials acted last week only after her government pressed Beijing.
   The European Union wants an explanation of a Chinese dairy scandal that has made thousands of infants ill, an official said on Friday, after the scare spread to milk in cartons and Starbucks dumped a supplier in China.
   Robert Madelin, director-general for health and consumer protection at the European Commission, said the European Union did not import Chinese infant milk powder and there had been no EU reports of illness from other imported Chinese dairy products.
   But with foreign consumers watching China again struggle with toxic food and claims of delays and cover-ups, Madelin told reporters in Beijing he expected an account of what went wrong.
   ‘We are trying to establish the facts. We are discussing all aspects of this crisis bilaterally with our colleagues in China,’ Madelin said.
   ‘On the governance aspects, we are also asking questions, and we will learn the truth probably about the same time you do.’

A civic forum, Nagarik Sanghati on Friday formed a human chain on the Dhaka University campus demanding a master plan for rehabilitation of labourers who lost their jobs due to the closure of public sector jute mills.
   The forum members and activists stood hand in hand near the TSC and held a brief rally narrating the woes of retrenched jute workers and criticising the government for putting much emphasis on so-called reforms in jute, sugar and railway sectors instead of caring for workers.
   Robaet Ferdous, a teacher of mass communication and journalism of Dhaka University, said that the government was ignoring the causes of the poor workers and protecting the interests of lenders and other foreign players.
   Writer Syed Abul Maksud, law teacher at Dhaka University Sheikh Hafizur Rahman and Nagarik Sanghati general secretary Sharifuzzaman Sharif were among those who took part in the programme.

Bangladesh will focus on the issues of food security, climate change and development when the chief adviser to the interim government, Fakhruddin Ahmed, delivers the country statement at the 63rd session of the United Nations General Assembly on September 26.
   The chief adviser is scheduled to leave the capital for New York today.
   Apart from attending a number of meetings in the UNGA, he is scheduled to participate in a roundtable on poverty and hunger, attend the opening segment of a high profile event on the Millennium Development Goals to be convened by the UN secretary general and join a plenary meeting on ‘Africa’s development needs; state of implementation of various commitments, challenges and the way forward’.
   Foreign ministry officials told New Age Thursday that Fakhruddin will also hold bilateral meetings with some heads of government and state as well as dignitaries on the sidelines of the UNGA apart from meeting the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon.
    The Bangladesh delegation for UNGA during the chief adviser’s visit will include foreign affairs adviser Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury, secretary to the Chief Adviser’s Office Kazi M Aminul Islam, chief adviser’s press secretary Syed Fahim Munaim and director general of the UN wing of the foreign ministry Hamid Rashid.
   During his eight-day stay in New York, Fakhruddin will attend a reception to be hosted by the US president, George W Bush, a welcome reception to be hosted by the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, and Mrs Ban Ki-moon in honour of heads of state and heads of government besides joining a dinner to be hosted by the UN secretary general.
   He will attend the special meeting of the Commonwealth heads of government, have meetings with Bangladeshi community and Network of Young Bangladeshi American Professionals (NYSAP) and attend a MDG reception.
   According to the tentative schedule, the chief adviser will attend a reception to be hosted by the president of South Africa marking the launch of the African Legacy Programme of the 2010 FIFA World Cup to be held in South Africa and a high level discussion on the food and climate change crisis convened by the UN secretary general.
   This will be his second participation in the UN general assembly as head of the caretaker government after assuming office on January 12 last year.
   Fakhruddin is scheduled to return on September 30.

Intern physicians of Comilla Medical College Hospital started work abstention on Friday demanding punishment for those responsible for Thursday’s clash on the campus that left 10 students injured.
   The clash ensued between the students and local people over the activities of Medical Assistant Training School on the college campus.
   The resident students of the medical college left their dormitories by Friday noon as per the decision of the college academic council.
   Earlier, the students arranged a press conference on the campus where they demanded exemplary punishment for the attackers and stoppage of all activities of the training school on the college campus.
   The medical college was closed for an indefinite period Thursday following the clash. College principal Sahara Khatun and principal of the MATS Shahiduddin filed separate cases after the incident.
   A three-member committee has been formed to probe the incident.

A bomb exploded in a religious school in insurgency-hit south-western Pakistan Friday, killing five people, the police said.
   The bomb was planted inside a school 15 kilometres (nine miles) north of Quetta, capital of Baluchistan province.
   ‘We have sent our teams to investigate the blast inside the school, which killed five students and wounded seven others,’ senior police official Wazir Khan Nasir told AFP.
   Nobody has so far claimed responsibility for the explosion.
   Tribal rebels in gas-rich Baluchistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, are waging an insurgency, demanding political autonomy and a greater share of profits from the region’s natural resources.
   Hundreds of people have died in violence in the province since the insurgency flared in late 2004. The province has also been hit by attacks blamed on Taliban militants.

Sufferings of the city dwellers, caused by frequent power outages and acute crisis of water, compounded in Ramadan with the authorities failing to keep their pledges in these regard.
   People in almost all the areas in the capital experience at least four hours of load shedding in every weekday, from half an hour to one hour at a stretch, amid sweltering heat while it becomes a double-blow for those facing acute scarcity of water in many areas.
   Although the Dhaka Power Distribution Company pledged only half an hour of load shedding in the city during evening peak hours — from 6:00pm to 10:00pm — residents of Rampura, Basabo, Paltan, Old Town in Dhaka city and parts of Mohammadpur said they were facing power outages for one and a half to two hours — each time for half an hour — during that period.
   The situation in Indira road area is worse than other places where many of the residents said they were experiencing load shedding for an hour in every two to three hours.
   ‘Load shedding begins at 9:00am every week day and it usually lasts for about two hours. After that we face an hour of power outage in every two to three hours,’ said Naseef, a Dhaka University student, who lives at West Razabazar.
   ‘During day time we face at least two hours of load shedding and three to four times — each time for half an hour — in the evening,’ said Shahana Haque, a housewife in Basabo area told New Age on Friday.
   The sufferings became horrendous when power outages take place during iftar, breaking of fasting, she said adding ‘In many days, we endure load shedding for an hour in midnight when we go to sleep.’
   The frequency of power outages, however, declined during the past two/three days, she added.
    DPDC managing director Ataul Masud on Friday declined the allegations saying it was not true that the residents in DPDC areas faced more than one hour of load shedding between 6:00pm and 10:00pm.
   ‘For the last few days, we have taken a programme to go for load shedding for only half an hour during the evening peak hours so that people do not face problem in taking iftar and offering tarabi prayers. I think we are running according to the plan,’ he claimed.
   While his attention was drawn about people’s claims in many areas, he said he would look into the matter.
   The DPDC along with the Dhaka Electric Supply Company (DESCO), which covers Mirpur, Gulshan, Uttara and Tongi, and the Rural Electrification Board, which covers seven palli bidyut samitys (PBSs) outside the capital, get around 1400-1450MW of electricity from the Power Development Board to supply in the capital and its adjacent areas against the demand of around 1800MW.
   People under the DESCO and REB also made complaints of facing load shedding for three to four hours a day — each time for one hour.
   Power situation usually improves in weekends — Friday and Saturday — for increased gas supply due to the closure of industries, and there was almost no load shedding in the city and most part of the country Friday evening as the PDB could generate 4036MW of power then due to the availability of gas, sources in PDB said.
   Power secretary M Fouzul Kabir Khan told New Age last week that they could not generate electricity as per the capacity because of inadequate gas supply and it resulted in the power outages. ‘We are currently generating around 3700MW of power in weekdays against the capacity of over 4000MW because of shortage of gas.’
   Apart from the power outages, residents at Shewrapara, parts of Mirpur, west Mohammadpur, East Razabazar, Rampura, Goran and Old Town of Dhaka face severe water crisis despite assurances by the Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authorities of smooth supply during the month of Ramadan.
   ‘Although there are two water pumps at Shewrapara, we do not get adequate supply of water. We remain awaken for almost all the night to run our water pumps as the water supply fell drastically since the beginning of Ramadan,’ said Abbas Ali, a resident at West Shewrapara.
   The residents at Shewarapara, Pirerbagh, Kazipara and Mirpur Section 10 said the water supplied by the Dhaka WASA was dirty.
   Dwellers in city’s east Goran and west Rampura said they had been getting stinking water from the supply lines of the Dhaka WASA for over 15 days.
   Many people in the areas also said they were buying bottled mineral water though it was unaffordable for them.
   People in the areas are contracting waterborne diseases like diarrhoea for drinking the stinking and discoloured water, residents of the area claimed.
   The demand for water in the city is about 200 crore litres a day while the WASA’s capacity to pump out water is around 175 crore litres a day. But WASA currently extracts around 150-160 crore litres a day.
   Dhaka WASA managing director Raihanul Abedin blamed power outages for the water crisis.
   ‘As we keep our pumps out of operation for at least five to six hours a day for power outages, we cannot draw water to the optimum level,’ he said, adding ‘We have, however, taken up sufficient measures, including supply through lorries, to ensure smooth water supply to the city dwellers.’
   DPDC officials, however, declined to shoulder the WASA blame, saying WASA gets 18 hours of uninterrupted power supply. Besides many pumps have generators.
   ‘They [Dhaka WASA] are trying to shift their failure to ensure adequate water supply to us,’ said a DPDC official.

Women’s rights are dwindling across Europe, anti-globalisation activists warned, blaming growing religious extremism and neo-liberalism.
   The trend has been observed across the continent and even in Sweden, a country normally seen as a pioneer in gender equality issues, Maria Hagberg, a Swedish member of the European Feminist Initiative network, told AFP.
   ‘We have seen a backlash in recent years in Europe and also in Sweden, which is known as the most egalitarian country in the world, but that is only on the surface,’ Hagberg said late Thursday on the sidelines of the European Social Forum being held in the southern Swedish city of Malmoe.
   The decline of women’s rights is a phenomenon taking place across Europe, said Soad Bekkouche, a representative of the French group Laicite (Secularity).
   ‘We see it clearly in everyday life,’ Bekkouche said.
   Hagberg said that in Sweden earlier strides were now being threatened due to politics and legislation, and pointed to a rise in violence against women.
   Five years ago, 20,000 acts of violence against women were reported, a number that has since grown to 30,000, she said.
   The growing inequality affects immigrant women in particular, said Soleyman Ghasemiani, a social worker originally from Iran and now living in Sweden’s second-biggest city Gothenburg.
   Paradoxically, authorities’ desire to display tolerance and respect of immigrants’ religions and culture could be accentuating the phenomenon.
   ‘The Swedish authorities and politicians have a lot of respect for religions and traditions and they think it’s not possible to criticise Islam,’ he told AFP, adding that in so doing they were playing into the hands of religious fundamentalists who want to suppress women’s rights. He linked the decline in women’s rights in Sweden in part to the centre-right government’s arrival in power in 2006.
   ‘The conservatives have more power now. There are more religious schools than five or 10 years ago (and) they get (state) subsidies. I am worried because I see a backlash on the ground,’ said Ghasemiani, who has lived in Sweden for 24 years.
   ‘You have people who are teaching their daughters that to be a good daughter is to stay at home,’ he said.
   Bekkouche said that across Europe, both ‘immigrant women and local women face the same problems amid the rise of religious extremism and neo-liberalism.’

The acting president of the Awami League, Zillur Rahman, on Friday said that conspiracies were being hatched to restore the ‘fallen forces’ to power and called on the party activists to guard against any such plots.
   ‘The January 11, 2007 changeover was the outcome of our movement to put an end to the misrule of the BNP-Jamaat alliance government. But the caretaker administration is increasingly favouring the BNP-Jamaat alliance which was solely responsible for the events leading to the emergency’, he said at an iftar party organised by the Dhaka-based Kotalipara Samiti at the Institution of Engineers.
   Addressing the gathering, AL presidium member Amir Hossain Amu demanded immediate and unconditional release of the party president Sheikh Hasina saying that her permanent release was the main condition for holding free, fair and credible elections.
   ‘Hold the national polls first and relieve the nation of the burden of the emergency’, he asked the caretaker government reminding it that holding parliamentary elections was the main task of an interim administration.
   Amu said that the government had conducted many ‘experiments’ but all of them proved futile and so the government should now concentrate on holding the general elections.
   Demanding national polls in accordance with the electoral roadmap, party presidium member Tofail Ahmed warned that the country would plunge into a ‘grave political crisis’ if parliamentary polls were not held with the end-December deadline.
   ‘People have doubt if national elections will be held as per the electoral roadmap announced by the Election Commission’, he said adding that the government was trying a new ploy to make the polls uncertain in the name of holding a ‘policy summit’ in November, just a month prior to parliamentary elections.
   Tofail warned that Awami League would be compelled to launch a tougher movement if there were conspiracies to foil the general elections.
   Party presidium member Matia Chowdhury was also critical of the caretaker administration for its move to arrange a ‘policy summit’ on ‘three major development issues’ in November, involving top leaders of the political parties. ‘The initiative has raised doubt in the people’s minds whether national elections will be held on time’, she said.
   ‘The government is trying to hold such a summit only to make Jamaat-e-Islami acceptable’, she said adding that such conspiracies were destined to fail.
   Akram Uddin Ahmed presided over the gathering addressed, among others, by AL leaders Mukul Bose, Faruq Khan and Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah and Kotalipara Samiti leaders Liakat Hossain Mollah, Ashalata Baidya and Kamal Sen.

Pakistan is close to completing a second plutonium-producing reactor, is well into building a third and these could increase its ability to make atomic bombs, a US think-tank said on Thursday.
   ‘The wider implication ... (is that) there is a real risk this will exacerbate an India-Pakistan nuclear arms race and increase tensions more broadly between the two,’ the Institute for Science and International Security said in a report.
   The regional arch-rivals have fought three wars, are both outside the global Non-Proliferation Treaty and have tested nuclear arms with Western technology imported ostensibly for peaceful atomic energy.
   But a 45-nation nuclear export cartel approved a waiver to its rules this month allowing trade with India as part
   of a civilian nuclear cooperation pact it struck with the United States. The entire undertaking could erode the NPT, critics say.
   ISIS, a well-connected Washington-based group, has been a prominent tracker of nuclear proliferation issues focusing on Iran, North Korea and Syria as well as Pakistan and India.
   Emailed to Reuters, the ISIS report included commercial satellite images taken two weeks ago and in February and May showing construction of the second and third Khushab complexes.
   Pakistan has an operating heavy-water reactor and heavy-water production plant already at Khushab.
   A row of cooling towers indicated the second reactor was close to completion and could be ready to operate in a year’s time, according to the 10-page report.
   ‘Once completed, these reactors will increase several-fold Pakistan’s ability to make weapons-grade plutonium (fuel).’
   The report estimated the reactors would run on power of ‘about 100 megawatts or more’, which could enable the two combined to yield plutonium for 8-10 atomic bombs a year.
   ‘When finished, the second and third Khushab reactors will allow a significant increase in the quantity and quality of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.’
   The report said India could easily match Pakistan’s moves given its own ability to churn out plutonium in heavy water reactors and a fast-breeder reactor under construction.
   ‘Rather than witnessing a wasteful and dangerous surge in the production of fissile materials for weapons in South Asia, the United States should make a key priority convincing Pakistan to join negotiations on a universal, verified Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty,’ the report said.
   UN negotiations on such a treaty, which would ban production of nuclear weapons fuel, have made no headway for years because of a lack of consensus among nuclear powers.
   Pakistan built its first nuclear power station in 1972 with Canadian help. But Western countries, under pressure from Washington, later severed cooperation amid suspicion that Pakistan was covertly developing nuclear weapons.
   Pakistan conducted five nuclear tests in 1998 in response to those of India, becoming a nuclear-armed state.

Workers Party president Rashed Khan Menon on Friday said that the government was planning to impose a ‘controlled political system’ in the country.
   As part of the design, the military-controlled interim administration has proposed holding of a conference of all political parties before parliamentary elections with an aim to impose a guideline on the next government, Menon said at the opening session of the party’s two-day central committee meeting at the Taher Auditorium in the capital.
   He said any such guidelines could be laid down by an elected parliament, not by a meeting between the chiefs of the two major political parties – Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia – or in a conference of the political parties.
   Menon called on the interim government to lift the sate of emergency for creating an atmosphere conducive to holding parliamentary elections first.
   He urged all non-communal, progressive and democratic political forces to be united for restoring the rights of the people.
   ‘The government must announce the date of parliamentary elections immediately to remove the doubts from the people’s minds about polls’, Menon said.
   The party general secretary Bimal Biswas, placed the political report at the meeting and called for forging a unity of the non-communal democratic political forces to save the country.
   Anil Biswas, Rabiul Alam, Rafiqul Islam, Mansur Ahmed, Imtiaz Uddin Babu, Abdul Matin Molla, Sekander Ali, Jahangir Alam Sabuj and Abul Hossain took part in the discussion on the report.
   More than one hundred leaders of the WP from across the country are taking part in the extended meeting.

An Afghanistan district governor was killed in a firefight involving Australian special forces soldiers, Australia’s military said on Friday.
   Chora district governor and tribal leader Rozi Khan Barekzai was among a number of people killed when an Australian patrol became involved in a firefight on Thursday near their Tarin Kowt base, the Australian Defence Force said in a statement.
   ‘It is not possible at this time to determine that he was killed by ADF fire,’ the military said.
   Australia, a close Washington ally, was an original member of the US-led coalition which arrived in the country in 2001 to oust the Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters.
   The country still has around 1,000 reconstruction and combat troops in southern Oruzgan province, where they are deployed alongside Dutch forces.

The chief adviser, Fakhruddin Ahmed, returned home on Thursday night concluding his four-day official visit to China during which he had discussions with all the top Chinese leaders.
   He had official talks with the Chinese prime minister, Wen Jiabao, when full assurance of cooperation and support came from the Chinese side in the field of trade, investment, agriculture, infrastructure and other areas for further enhancing the exiting excellent friendly relations between the two countries.
   Three accords were signed between Bangladesh and China capping the official talks.
   The chief adviser had also meeting with the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, and vice-president, Xi Jinping. The head of the interim government attended the closing ceremony of Paralympics Beijing 2008 at the Bird’s Nest in Beijing. A number of heads of government and state also attended the Paralympics closing ceremony.
   A Dragon Air flight carrying the chief adviser and his entourage from Beijing via Hong Kong landed at Zia International Airport at about 00:30am.
   The finance adviser, AB Mirza Azizul Islam, home adviser, MA Matin, dean of diplomatic corps, chiefs of three services of the Armed Forces and senior civil and military officials received the chief adviser at the VVIP tarmac of the airport.
   The chief adviser left Dhaka for Beijing early Monday for the tour at the invitation of the Chinese government.

The education ministry has issued a notice to the Asian University of Bangladesh asking the university to explain its breaching rules such as offering unapproved courses and recruiting substandard teachers.
   The ministry on Thursday issued the show-cause notice asking the university at Uttara in Dhaka to reply in seven working days or to face legal action.
   The notice said the university had failed to set up its own, permanent campus five years inside its establishment in 1996.
   According to the Private University Act 1992 as amended in 1998, private universities may set up campuses in any place with government approval, but they must move to their own, permanent campuses, spanning at least five acres of land in five years after establishment.
   ‘The university offers degrees without approval from the government from its main campus and on distance mode, and runs outer campuses in Rajshahi and Khulna illegally,’ the notice said.
   The university has appointed substandard teachers and the government was not informed of their academic qualifications; and part-time teachers have no certification from the authorities concerned, according to the notice.
   ‘Necessary action will be taken in keeping with the Private University Act 1992, as amended in 1998, if the university fails to give a satisfactory answer by the stipulated time,’ said a deputy secretary, who signed the notice.
   ‘The show-cause notice has been issued in line with the recommendations and observations of an inquiry report prepared by a committee formed by the University Grants Commission,’ he said.
   There are 51 private universities in Bangladesh.

The Rapid Action Battalion recovered 12 bombs from a shop at Nolta under Naria upazila in Shariatpur early Friday.
   Tipped off, a RAB team raided a shop in the area at about 4:00am and recovered the bombs which were kept inside a carton.
   RAB officials said there was a gunfight between two criminal gangs — one led by Chunnu and another by Nasir — at Nolta on August 24 that left 10 people injured, six with bullets.
   The elite force suspected that one of the gangs might have kept the bombs at the shop to use during further clash.

The Indian police shot dead two Islamic militants during a fierce gun battle in a Muslim area of New Delhi Friday, officials said, less than a week after the capital was hit by serial bombings.
   The fighting erupted around house in Jamia Nagar, in the south of the capital, when police acting on a tip-off came across a small group of militants holed up in a building.
   ‘Two terrorists have been killed, one was arrested
   and two more escaped. Two officers have also received gunshot injuries,’ police commissioner Karnail Singh told reporters.
   Singh said one of the dead militants was identified as Atiq, wanted in connection with serial bombings in the western city Ahmedabad on July 26.
   New Delhi was hit by serial blasts in busy shopping areas last Saturday which left 22 dead and around 100 wounded. The attacks were claimed by an Islamist group calling itself the Indian Mujahideen.