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Poor and marginal farmers and sharecroppers keep facing trouble as they need to buy rice for higher prices after having sold the rice they would produce for low prices at the time of harvest.
   Market source said farmers were buying boro for prices between Tk 540 and Tk 600 a maund (37.3kg) but they sold it for prices between Tk 400 and Tk 430 soon after harvest.
   Most of the poor and marginal farmers said they were forced to sell their produces for prices lower than their production cost to meet their needs and repay loans they had taken before harvest in May.
   Middle-class farmers could stock their rice, but small and marginal farmers could not do so as they needed to run their family with they could earn by selling the rice.
   ‘I had to sell rice for Tk 430 a maund as I do not have the facility for storage and I needed to repay loans and run my family. I kept a stock for only four months. I have used up the stock and I have now borrowed money and I am buying rice for Tk 520 a maund to run my family,’ said Hossain Mollah, a poor farmer of Nikli in Kishoreganj.
   The research division chief at the Centre for Policy Dialogue, Uttam Dev, said it was a common phenomenon and he stressed the need for keeping prices of food grains, especially rice, stable.
   ‘The government should increase loan programmes for food silos and increase the amount of rice procurement during harvest to control price fluctuation,’ he said.
   The New Age correspondent in Rangpur said farmers in the north had sold out their yield of rice during harvest for lower prices. They are now buying rice for higher prices.
   Habibullah Miah, a farmer of Nandiganj in the Rangpur district headquarters, told New Age he had grown IRRI and boro on a bigha (a third of an acre) of land. He had to spend about Tk 3,500 on production.
   He had to take loans to irrigate the field, buy fertiliser and pesticide. He could harvest 22 maunds of rice and he had to sell the rice soon after harvest for Tk 400 a maund to repay the loans. Now he needs to buy rice for Tk 20 a kilogram, and it means he needs to spend about Tk 750 on a maund of rice.
   ‘The cost of the farming increases every year and we could not save any rice for the lean period,’ Habibullah said.
   Sharecropper Abdul Mannaf of Dhusmara, a remote char in the River Teesta at Kaunia in Rangpur, said he had grown boro on 24 decimals of land.
   He could harvest 20 maunds of rice and gave a half to the owner of the land. He needed to spend about Tk 3,000 on farming and in doing so, he needed to take loans.
   Soon after harvest, he sold the rice for Tk 400 a maund to repay the loans and to grow aman on the piece of land. ‘I have no job in hand now as the harvest is about a month away. I borrowed two maunds of rice from a rice bank set up by the non-governmental organisation Rangpur-Dinajpur Rural Services.’
   The correspondent in Jaipurhat said after harvest, farmers were very upset about the low price of boro and sold the produce for prices between Tk 400 and 420 Tk a maund. The farmers are now buying rice for prices between Tk 600 and Tk 650 a maund.
   Akbar Ali, a farmer of the Jaipurhat district headquarters, said boro production was good, but they could earn not much by selling their yield. He was forced to sell the rice he produced for lower prices to pay the labourers who worked on his field.
   The correspondent in Kushtia reported a similar situation. Rice prices started increasing only in October, and the prices have increased by Tk 2 to Tk 5 on a kilogram.
   The government bought boro paddy for Tk 14 a kilogram and rice for Tk 22 a kilogram. Prices on the market at the time ranged between Tk 24 and Tk 30 depending on the varieties. The prices have now increased to Tk 28 to Tk 34, according to market sources.
   Farmers earlier hurriedly sold out their rice in view of a forecast in April that because of decline in prices, farmers might not be able to recover even the production cost from the sales of their yield.
   And the paddy and the rice finally reached the millers and hoarders. Wholesalers are now selling rice for higher prices and farmers, especially the poor and marginal farmers, continue to be in trouble.

Farmers of the Barind Tract who have grown aman feared poor outturn as there has been no rain for days and because of pest infestation.
   Farmers feared if they failed fail to irrigate the aman fields, the outturn would fall, which would in turn increase rice prices.
   Farmers in many areas of the tract such as Godagari and Tanore in Rajshahi and some places in Naogaon on Friday arranged a session of special prayers in mosques and churches seeking rain.
   Farmers in the north, which is know as the warehouse of rice, especially Rajshahi and Naogaon, could not grow aman as it rained little in the rainy season. Thousands of acres of land in the north were also not cultivated.
   The government announced to supply free electricity for 100 hours to each irrigation pump and farmers owning a bigha of land would not need to pay electric bill to run pumps for an hour and a half a day.
   But the irrigation pumps remained idle because of shortage of electric supply, farmers said.
   Paddy leaves have turned brown because of insufficient rainfall. In some fields, plants have matured, but pest attack has threatened the outturn.
   Pests such as stem borer, millibug, green grass hopper and sheath blight are damaging the crops in almost all upazilas in the Barind Tract.
   ‘We are now more concerned about irrigation as the drought might last all through the aman season,’ said Rafiqul Islam, a farmer of Godagari. A dozen others echoed his concerns.
   Many farmers of Tanore and Godagari said the Barind Multipurpose Development Authority had not supplied any water free as announced by the government.
   They said because of medium rainfall in August, they had not felt the need for MDA water when they cultivated aman.
   But now they need water for irrigation and the BMDA authorities are unwilling to supply water, they said.
   ‘BMDA pump operators said they had supplied water free at the beginning of aman season and as the farmers felt no need for that, the BMDA stopped the supply,’ Nur Mohammed, a farmer of Tanore, told New Age. He said rice prices would increase if aman outturn declines.
   BMDA executive engineer Jahangir Alam Khan said erratic power supply had hampered irrigation. ‘We supplied water free for 100 hours to 23,700 hectares of aman field in the district.’ But he brushed aside the allegations farmers had levelled against the authorities.
   Aman has been cultivated on 82,800 hectares of land in the district this year, Department of Agricultural Extension officials said. They said aman cultivation had been hampered because of inadequate rainfall.
   ‘Aman farming in many places has been hampered because of irrigation although the BMDA supplied water to the fields,’ said Dipen Mohanta, a DAE official in Rajshahi.
   Farmers of Tanore and Godagari on Friday joined the special prayer session seeking rainfall. ‘We arranged the prayer session in churches seeking rainfall,’ Narendra Tudu, a farmer of Jugisho at Tanore, said.
   A special prayer session was also held in mosques after the jumma prayers.

The leader of the opposition, Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s chairperson Khaleda Zia, on Friday called on the owners of garment factories to pay the workers’ wages and salaries by the first week of every month.
   She said that the government should provide policy support to the apparel factories, improve the law and order situation to ensure the right industrial environment, and give the garment sector a sufficient financial stimulus package to help it to fight off the adverse effects of the global recession.
   She alleged that extortion and tender grabbing by Awami League-backed persons and clashes between the cadres of the party to control the ‘jhut’ (waste cloth of garment factories) business were damaging the environment in the industrial sector.
   ‘I call on the BGMEA leaders to ensure payment of wages and salaries to the workers by the first week of every month,’ said Khaleda while addressing the closing ceremony of the BATEXPO-2009 at a city hotel on Friday afternoon.
   Paying wages to the workers regularly has become critically important as the soaring prices of essentials are making the low-income people helpless, she said.
   She also urged the garment factory owners to resolve the disputes with workers through discussion on a regular basis and increase measures for their welfare which, according to her, will ultimately help the sector to gain stability and flourish.
   She, however, demanded formation of an industrial police and intelligence force for the garments sector.
   She said the government has ignored the garments sector while designing the stimulus package and has concentrated only on the agriculture, power and some export sectors.
   The government unveiled a Tk 34.24 billion stimulus package in April, for the last quarter of the 2008-2009 fiscal year, to help the country to deal with the impact of the global financial meltdown on its economy.
   ‘But the reality is that the package is yet to reach the export sectors,’ said Khaleda. ‘I am asking the government to ensure that the garment sector gets a piece of the package as we have to keep the prices of our products competitive to survive the recession in the global market.’
   She also demanded reduction of the seaports’ and banks’ charges, resolution of the power and gas crises, and exhorted the government to make the Bangladeshi missions abroad more active so that they can lobby more effectively for greater access to foreign markets including that of the USA
   The BNP’s secretary-general, Khandakar Delwar Hossain, demanded an unbiased probe into the recent instability in the garment sector and identification of the persons responsible for the unrest. ‘The people will not accept a politically biased investigation,’ he warned while addressing the gathering as a special guest.
   The BGMEA’s president, Abdus Salam Murshedy, called on the opposition party to play its due role in the Parliament to protect the garment sector.
   Former commerce ministers M Shamsul Islam and Amir Khasru Mahmud Chowdhury, former commerce adviser to the premier Barkat Ullah Bulu and BGMEA vice presidents M Shafiul Islam Mohiuddin and M Siddiqur Rahman also addressed the gathering.

A Dhaka court on Friday ordered three suspected militants, arrested Wednesday night at a place in Chittagong in connection with a plot to attack the US embassy in Dhaka, to be remanded in custody for interrogation for two days.
   The Detective Branch on Wednesday night arrested Mufti Harun Izahar, Shahidul Islam Suzon and Al Amin alias Saiful at a madrassah at Lalkhan Bazar in Chittagong on charges of plotting an attack on the US embassy in Dhaka.
   The three, suspected of being leaders of Lashkar-e-Taiba, were sent to Dhaka Thursday night after their arrest at Harun Izhar’s house at Dakkhin Khulshi in Chittagong.
   Harun Izhar, 33, is the principal of an Islamic kindergarten named Al Imin Academy and Shahidul Islam, 26 and Al Amin, 27, are teachers of the kindergarten.
   The police suspected one of the three was an Indian and another was a Pakistani although the arrested told the police, officials said, one of them is from Mymensingh and another from Bhola. The third, Harun Izahar, is son of Mufti Izharul Islam Chowdhury, chairman of a faction of the Islamic Oikya Jote.
   Detective Branch subinspector Gias Uddin, also the investigation officer of the case, produced the arrested in the chief metropolitan magistrate’s court seeking them to be remanded in custody for 10 days. Magistrate AGM Al Masud allowed them to be remanded for two days.
   The investigation officer in court said during preliminary interrogation, the arrested admitted to plotting attacks on the US embassy and the Indian high commission and they needed to be interrogated in custody for 10 days to elicit information on the plot and the planners.
   A high Detective Branch official told New Age, ‘The mobile we have seized from Harun Izhar was used when the arrested went to Baridhara for reconnaissance n the past week.’
   ‘Harun named five militants, including his brother Mufti Faizur Rahman, also known as Faizullah, who received Tk 6 lakh from Abdulla Rehan through a Dhaka bank as expense for part of the planned attack,’ he said.
   Another high official on the investigation team said, ‘The attackers planned the attack at a meeting at religious instruction centre near the madrassah at Lalkhan Bazar.’
   ‘We came to know that the amount they received was meant for explosive collection,’ he said.
   The other official said based on information provided by the arrested, the Detective Branch had raided places in Dhaka, Mymensingh and Bhola.
   Izharul Islam Chowdhury, meanwhile at a briefing in Chittagong on Friday afternoon, demanded immediate release of his son, Harun Izhar, and the other two.
   ‘The police have not produced them in court even 72 hours inside their arrest. This is an apparent violation of the law,’ he said, claiming that his son had no link with militancy.
   He also said some media houses were instigating the government in anti-Islam activities so that a gap could be created between the government and Islamic forces.
   ‘Such people misled the government in the past and they are now doing the same thing again,’ Izharul Islam said, referring to the 11 conditions on which they joined the alliance led by the ruling Awami League.
   He said the ruling party was not going by the conditions although the faction of the Islami Oikya Jote had confidence in the prime minister. He urged the government to release the arrested immediately.
   Izharul Islam said the government earlier arrested him on charges of fake militancy link and the court acquitted him as charges were proved baseless.
   He said the arrested and the madrassah at Lalkhan Bazar had no link with militancy and he criticised media reports that identified two of the arrested as Pakistani and Indian.
   Several faction leaders such as Sarwar Kamal Aziz, Mufti Habibur Rahman Kashemi, Abdur Rahman Chowdhury, Fazlul Karim and Azizul Islam attended the briefing at the madrassah.

Dhaka is moving positively towards holding 'conclusive talks' with Washington for signing the long pending Trade and Investment Framework Agreement which, the government hopes, would usher in a new era in the US-Bangladesh trade relations.
   A summary of the draft agreement, prepared by the commerce ministry, awaits endorsement by the prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, before the ministry enters final rounds of negotiations with the US officials, sources close to the Prime Minister's Office told New Age.
   After the recent visit by the US assistant trade representative, Michael J Delaney, the Awami League government is actively considering 'further negotiations' with the United States taking into consideration Bangladesh's economic and business interests, the sources pointed out.
   'Of course the mood is positive about TIFA although the new government has taken its time to examine the sensitivity of the agreement. We think, this is a "vegetarian" agreement which itself will provide for provision to form a joint council in order to promote trade and investment,' a highly placed source involved in the process said.
   The TIFA is being considered at a time when the Awami League government is going to discuss the issue of transit with Bhutan and India during prime minister Sheikh Hasina's upcoming visit to land-locked Bhutan and then India.
   The official said that the government was almost convinced that signing the agreement would not harm Bangladesh's interest although some experts had already cautioned that such an agreement between unequal partners might prove discriminatory to Bangladesh.
   Amid controversies surrounding the proposed TIFA, talks on which began in 2003, the government is likely to discuss with the stakeholders, such as business community, on certain provisions of the agreement that might be sensitive for Bangladesh.
   The commerce ministry, which raised questions about intellectual property rights, labour standards and environmental issues, was told by US side that those issues were just mentioned in the preamble of the agreement and that they would not be binding.
   The US officials in Dhaka and also trade diplomats, who examined the latest TIFA draft, said there were only two obligations in the proposed agreement: formation of a council for discussion on the issues of trade and investment and holding of at least one meeting a year.
   Both US officials and the commerce ministry officials said Bangladesh's international obligations under multilateral and other agreements and the country's entitlements to certain facilities and concessions under the current global trading regime would not be affected by the TIFA.
   Asked if the United States would opt for making the draft TIFA public for the sake of avoiding controversies, an official of the US mission in Dhaka said Washington was not in a position to make the draft public before signing of the agreement. 'There are other drafts of TIFA and this one is similar to that,' said the US official.
   During the meeting with the assistant US trade representative, the country's business leaders broadly agreed with the proposal for formation of a platform to discuss relevant issues under the TIFA, and said they should be consulted before finalising the agreement.
   Expressing Washington's willingness to sign the TIFA with Bangladesh, Michael Delaney told eminent citizens here that a US-Bangladesh TIFA would serve as the forum for government and business representatives from the two nations to discuss economic issues of mutual interest.
   The balance of trade between the two countries is in favour of Bangladesh, due mainly to export of garments and also frozen foods. The US imported goods and commodities worth $3.7 billion in 2008 while her exports to Bangladesh amounted to $468 million in the same year.

An army psychiatrist about to be sent to Iraq gunned down 13 people and wounded 30 in a rampage on a huge Texas military base but survived after being shot four times himself.
   Major Nidal Malik Hasan, who his family said had been harrassed because of his Muslim faith and was ‘mortified’ at the prospect of going to Iraq, fought for his life in intensive care at the Fort Hood base as army investigators on Friday pieced together the motives for the massacre.
   Fort Hood, one of the biggest military bases in the world, was in lockdown and was to hold a day of mourning a day after the officer trained his guns on his colleagues.
   Another officer shot him four times to end the killings and was herself wounded.
   Hasan, 39, opened fire with two non-army issue pistols at a medical processing centre for troops being deployed from Fort Hood to Iraq and Afghanistan, officials said.
   Fort Hood commander Lieutenant General Bob Cone said one of the guns was a semi-automatic weapon, which ‘might explain the rate of fire that he apparently obtained.’
   Cone said Hasan had acted alone. The gunman was blocked from reaching a graduation ceremony attended by some 600 people, close to the scene of carnage.
   Hasan was ‘not currently speaking to investigators,’ Cone said.
   ‘As horrible as this was, it could have been much worse,’ the commander said as he praised the rapid reaction to the shootings. The first-responder was shot by Hasan but survived and managed to take him down.
   Most of the victims were military personnel and many were taken to a local hospital, which put out an urgent call for blood donations as streams of wounded poured into its emergency rooms.
   Shock and dismay hung over the military community after the killings.
   ‘I can’t imagine that anyone could have seen this coming,’ said Mary Keller, president and chief executive of the Military Child Education Coalition, which helps youths cope with life in the armed forces.
   The central Texas base was locked down for several hours as the shocked community searched for a possible motive.
   After interviewing over 100 people at the scene, authorities appeared to have ruled out the possibility of a second shooter.
   Hasan was a military psychiatrist who dealt with troops returning from combat and faced his own imminent deployment.
   The shooter’s cousin said the major was ‘mortified by the idea of having to deploy’ and that Hasan had been harassed by other soldiers for being a Muslim, particularly since the September 11, 2001 attacks.
    ‘He wanted to do whatever he could within the rules to make sure he wouldn’t go over,’ Nader Hasan told The New York Times, adding that his cousin had retained a lawyer and sought to get out of the army before the end of his contract.
   The major was born in the United States to Palestinian parents who had moved from a small town near Jerusalem, Nader Hasan added.
   A surveillance video aired by CNN showed the major wearing traditional Arab garb at a convenience store on the base just hours before the shooting as he purchased coffee and hashbrowns.
   A Virginia Tech University graduate, Hasan had worked at the Walter Reed Army Medical Centre in Washington and obtained his medical degree from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland.
   President Barack Obama, who had been kept informed as the rampage was tracked in the White House situation room, denounced the ‘horrific outburst of violence’ and urged Americans to pray for those killed and wounded.
   ‘It’s difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas,’ he said. ‘It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an army base on American soil.’
   The US Senate held a moment of silence in sombre acknowledgement of the rampage.
   The shooting spree dealt a new blow to an American military already under severe strain from repeated combat tours during years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan and plagued by a rise in suicides and depression.
   Obama is considering whether to accede to a demand from his war commander in Afghanistan for tens of thousands more troops to be deployed there to fight the Taliban.
   Fort Hood, which houses tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians, has also shouldered some of the nation’s biggest burdens. The stress of repeated deployments to America’s two wars also has the base posting the highest number of suicides at US military bases — 75 since 2003.
   The base’s 1st Calvary Division, some 15,000 soldiers, is currently deployed to Iraq. Fort Hood has suffered the highest casualties of any US military base there.

Today is the 34th anniversary of the soldier-people uprising of November 7, 1975, which led to the release of the then chief of army staff, Ziaur Rahman, from captivity in the Dhaka cantonment.
   Different political parties and organisations will observe the day in different manners.
   The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its associate bodies will observe the day as ‘national revolution and solidarity day’.
   The Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal and some other political parties will mark it as ‘the day of mass-upheaval of people and sepoys’.
   The BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia and secretary general Khandaker Delwar Hossain gave separate messages on the occasion.
   In her message, Khaleda said the people and soldiers had foiled a conspiracy of hegemonic forces on this day in 1975 and consolidated the nation’s sovereignty which led Ziaur Rahman to take the helm. ‘Bangladesh still faces crisis and the hegemonic forces are making fresh bids to grab our sovereignty …,’ she said and called upon the people to guard against such ‘conspiracies’ and to build a fresh resistance against the evil forces ‘in the manner of November 7, 1975.’
   The BNP and its associate bodies have chalked out programmes, including hoisting party flag, holding prayer sessions and offering fateha at the graveside of Zia.
   Khaleda will place flowers at the grave of Ziaur Rahman, the late president and founder of the BNP, in the morning. A discussion will be held in the afternoon at the Institution of Engineers in Dhaka.
   The Colonel Taher Sangsad will form a human chain in front of the National Museum at Shahbagh at 11:00am demanding that the documents of the secret trial and execution of colonel Taher be made public.
   A documentary ‘genocide in armed forces’ will be screened at the Central Public Library at 4:00pm
   The Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal led by Hasanul Huq Inu will hold a discussion at Colonel Taher auditorium at 3:00pm. Another faction of the JSD will place wreaths at the grave of colonel Taher at Kajla of Netrakona.
   The JSD-backed Chhatra League will bring out a procession on the Dhaka University campus marking the mass-sepoy uprising day.
   The day had been observed as a public holiday since 1976, excepting for the Awami League’s 1996-2001 rule. It was restored as a public holiday in 2001 when the BNP-led alliance government had come to power.
   On November 28, 2007, Fakhruddin Ahmed-led interim government scrapped November 7 as a public holiday that came into effect in 2008.
   Associate bodies of the ruling Awami League and cultural organisations loyal to it will, however, observe the day as ‘the day of the killing of freedom fighter soldiers’.
   The Pachattarer Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee will hold a discussion marking the day of the killing of freedom fighter-soldiers at 23, Bangabandhu Avenue. The Bangabandhu Sangskritik Jote will hold a rally in front of the Awami League office demanding trial of the killers of freedom fighter officers.

The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, has said Bangladesh and Bhutan can develop land communication through India at three points —Burimari Port (Lalmonirhat), Tamabil (Sylhet) and Naoka (Sherpur) — to help increase bilateral trade and people-to-people contact between the two close neighbours.
   The prime minister arrived in Thimpu on a four-day official visit to Bhutan on Friday.
   The prime minister made the observation when the Bhutanese foreign minister, Lyonpo Ugyen Tshering, paid a courtesy call on her at her hotel suite in the evening.
   Hasina said the Bangladesh foreign minister talked to the Indian government about direct land communications between Bangladesh and Bhutan, and India has given a positive response to it.
   The prime minister told Lyonpo Ugyen Tshering that Bhutan could use Bangladeshi ports, especially Mongla Port, for carrying out trade with any third country.
   Hasina also reiterated her call to introduce package tourism among Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan for best utilising the tourism prospects of the three South Asian countries saying it will expedite national and regional development.
   The prime minister called for closer fraternity among the South Asian countries for poverty alleviation and tackling threats posed by climate change as she described the two are ‘common enemies’ of the region. The deputy press secretary to the prime minister, Nazrul Islam, briefed newsmen on the outcome of the meeting.
   Hasina highly praised the King of Bhutan for ‘voluntarily’ establishing democracy in this Himalayan country.
   She said democracy presently existed in all the South Asian countries making way for working together in full-swing for ensuring people’s economic emancipation in the region.
   Hasina thanked the Bhutanese government for giving her a warm reception on her arrival. ‘I’m overwhelmed by the warm reception and hospitality extended by the Bhutan government, its friendly people and sweet kids,’ she said.
   She recalled the memories of her and other family members’ difficult days in captivity during the 1971 liberation war, but became delighted when they heard on radio that Bhutan was the first country in recognising independent Bangladesh.
   ‘Emotions always work in me when I recall the day of Bhutan’s recognition. That’s why I have come on my first bilateral visit to Bhutan,’ she said.
   On climate change issue, the prime minister mentioned the flashflood in Bhutan in last June and the earthquake in September last, saying natural disasters in the region had increased due to the global climate change.
   She deeply condoled the death of Bhutanese people in the recent natural disasters.
   With no fault of their own, countries like Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal and the Maldives are the worst sufferers of the climate change, she said.
   Hasina mentioned about the glacier melting in the Himalaya due to the global warming and said Nepal and Bhutan would mostly be affected by this.
   The Bhutanese foreign minister thanked the prime minister for her statements in international conferences about the global warming impacts on Bhutan and other South Asian countries.
   Foreign minister Dipu Moni, adviser to the prime minister HT Imam, ambassador Ziauddin, Bangladesh ambassador to Bhutan AKM Majibur Rahman Bhuiyan and Bhutanese ambassador in Dhaka Dasho Bap Kesang were present in the meeting.
   Later, the speaker of the Bhutan National Assembly, Jigme Tshultim, and the chairman of the Bhutan National Council, Namgye Penjore, along with some Bhutanese MPs called on the Bangladesh prime minister at her hotel suite.
   During the meetings, the prime minister and the speaker emphasised exchange of visits between the MPs of the two countries.
   The two prime ministers are scheduled to attend a joint press conference on Saturday.
   The Bhutan-Bangladesh bilateral trade agreement will be signed on Saturday while on the same day the Bangladesh prime minister will handover Bangladesh’s earthquake relief assistance materials to her Bhutanese counterpart.
   Hasina and her entourage will return home on November 9.

Two more crime suspects were killed in ‘crossfire’ between their associates and the police and the Rapid Action Battalion in Dhaka and Kushtia early Friday.
   Friday’s incidents took to 120 the total death figure from extrajudicial killing such as ‘crossfire’ or ‘encounter’ by the Rapid Action Battalion and the police after January 6 when the Awami League-led government assumed office.
   The deceased were Mohammad Amir Ali, 34, a close associate of crime suspect Taj who is one the prowl at Mirpur and Kafrul, and Mujibur Rahman Babu, 38, an operative of the extremist outfit Gana Mukti Fauz.
   Battalion officials said one of its team, tipped off, raided Ibrahimpur Bazar at Kafrul where some crime suspects were holding a meeting about 2:45am.
   The battalion said Amir Ali was wounded in a shootout between his associates and the battalion team at Ibrahimpur Bazar.
   As the team reached the place, the crime suspects fired into the lawmen, who fired back.
   Amir died after being caught in the firing at one point. His associates managed to get away. The battalion also seized a light gun and five cartridges from the scene.
   He was taken Dhaka Medical College Hospital where he was pronounced dead about 3:30am.
   The Kafrul police officer-in-charge, Delwar Ahmed, told New Age, ‘Amir was wanted by the police in several cases, including murder.’
   The New Age correspondent in Kushtia said Mujibur Rahman Babu, a regional leader of the ultra-left Gana Mukti Fauz, the military wing of Sramajibi Mukti Andolan, was killed in ‘crossfire’ with the police at Swarupdaha of Mirpur early Friday.
   The police said a joint team of the Detective Branch and the Mirpur police raided a hideout at Koymara Beel on information that some gangsters were meeting there about 2:30am.
   As the lawmen approached, the extremists fired into the team, which fired back.
   Babu died after being caught in the firing at one point during the gunfight. His associates managed to get away. The police seized a light gun and six bullets from the place.
   The body was sent to the Kushtia General Hospital morgue for a post-mortem examination.
   Babu, was accused in cases related to murder, abduction, robbery and rape, the police said.

Various garment factory workers’ rights bodies on Friday, from separate rallies in the Muktangan, called on the Awami League-led government to introduce trade unionism in garment factories within three months and ensure a minimum wage of Tk 5,000/-.
   The leaders of the Bangladesh Garment Workers Unity Council and Garment Workers Unity Forum said that the government had pledged that it would introduce trade unions in garment factories but has taken no steps to do so till date.
   Finally, after the killing of three workers of Nippon Garments by the police in Tongi on October 31, the government decided in principle to introduce trade unions in garment factories and has formed a 12-member committee to this effect.
   The labour rights bodies also called on the government to immediately take steps for increasing the minimum wage of garment factory workers to Tk 5,000/- per month to enable them to survive at a time when prices of essentials are sky-rocketing.
   It is impossible for a worker to feed his/her family on a minimum wage of only Tk 1,662/- per month.
   The president of the Garment Workers Unity Forum, Mushrefa Mishu, demanded the arrest and trial of the owner(s) of Nippon Garments whose abrupt and unlawful closure of the factory led to the killing of three workers.
   She also demanded compensation for the dead and wounded workers of the factory and withdrawal of all the cases filed against them.
   Forum leaders Komol Debnath Rana, Shahidul Islam Sobuj, Amena Akhter and Shanti Begum also spoke at the rally.
   The central leader of the BGWUC, Mohammad Delwar Hossain, said that the AL had pledged in its election manifesto
   that the minimum wage of the garment factory workers would be increased but has still done nothing to do so.
   The BGWUC announced a fortnight-long mass contact programme to press home its demands. It will form human chains, stage rallies and bring out processions in the industrial areas and hold a central rally in Muktangan on November 20.
   The leaders of the central steering committee of the organisation — Mohammad Touhidur Rahman, SM Masud
   Rana and Selina Ahmed Tania — also spoke at the rally.

The Criminal Investigation Department on Friday sent the detained former BNP state minister for home affairs Lutfozzaman Babar to the Task Force for Interrogation Cell in the August 21 grenade attack case.
   The CID, meanwhile, interrogated former deputy inspector general of the Special Branch Shamsul Islam and the former Armed Police Battalion superintendent Mostofa Kamal in the case.
   Shamsul Islam was the acting Special Branch chief in the absence of the chief additional inspector general Abdul Qaiyum and Mostofa Kamal was additional deputy commissioner of the Motijheel zone of the police when the incident took place.
   A CID official said Babar, during interrogation, claimed he had first been informed of the incident by former deputy inspector general Shamsul Islam for which Shamsul was summoned to the CID office on Friday.
   The CID official also said the detained Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami founder Moulana Sheikh Abdus Salam, also the chief of the Islamic Democratic Party, named a person to have link with a white microbus that carried the attackers from Bangabandhu Avenue after the attack.
   Some CID personnel also conducted several raids on city places such as Mohammadpur to arrest that person named Monir.
   A high official on the investigation team told New Age, ‘We have interrogated Shamsul Islam and Mostofa Kamal as part of the investigation.’
   CID officials said both of them had been interrogated, separately and together, for hours. Babar and Shamsul Islam were also interrogated face-to-face.
   The officials also said they had sent letters to then inspector general of police Shahudul Huq, then Dhaka Metropolitan Police commissioner Ashraful Huda and then CID chief former additional inspector general Forrukh Ahmad asking them to the CID office for interrogation the case.
   The detained Harkatul chief Mufti Abdul Hannan was sent to the Dhaka Central Jail Friday afternoon after being remanded in custody for two days in two phases by the Criminal Investigation Officer although he had been remanded in the custody of the Detective Branch at Mirpur in another case.
   Another BNP deputy minister Abdus Salam Pintu is now in jail and his brother Maulana Tajuddin, also a leader of Lashkar-e-Taiba, accused in the case, is in hiding.
   Twenty-four people, including Awami League’s women affairs secretary Ivy Rahman, were killed and 200 others injured in the grenade attack on the Awami League rally on Bangabandhu Avenue on August 21, 2004.

A Bangladeshi minor girl was killed when the Indian Border Security Force without provocation.
   The body of the girl was handed over to Raumari police at about 10:00pm for autopsy, said Raumari police chief Kafiluddin.
   Locals said the Indian border guards had continued fringing intermittently into Bangladesh territory after the incident. The Bangladesh Rifles returned the fire.
   Deployment of BDR soldiers along the border has been reinforced.
   The BDR commander at Raumari border outpost, Abdul Kalam Azad told newsmen that they had instructed the people of the bordering villages to shift to safer places.

Babulal Mahato hides in paddy fields each night in an eastern Indian village as security forces carry out search operations for Maoist supporters.
   Along with dozens of villagers in West Bengal, 85-year-old Mahato does the same when the Maoists come to the village.
   'I am too old, so I hide,' said Mahato, his eyes weary after spending many sleepless nights outside.
   'Many villagers have already left their homes and fled, fearing getting caught between the Maoists and police.'
   In Lalgarh, a cluster of 150 villages, daily rebel ambushes, police raids and civilians caught in the middle may be a sign of things to come as the government prepares an offensive against Maoist insurgents.
   Central and state police in armoured vehicles scour nearby jungles, a signal of the start of government's bid to stem a growing decades-long insurgency.
   After a resounding general election win in May, the Congress party-led government, no longer dependent on communist parties in its coalition, has decided to take on an estimated 22,000 Maoist rebels who hold sway over swathes of countryside.
   Operation 'Green Hunt' reflects growing concerns that Maoists were becoming too strong after a decades-long insurgency. India's strong economic growth of the last few years did little to bring millions of poor villagers and tribals out of the poverty that helps act as the backbone of Maoist support.
   In recent months, brazen attacks on passenger trains, attacks on mining companies and the beheading of a policeman have sparked national soul searching.
   Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee has warned Maoist violence was a drain on resources.
   Politicians and rights activists now debate the planned offensive. Will it stem Maoist influence, or will it just inflame tensions as villagers get caught in the crossfire?
   'Local people are at risk of being caught in the middle of the fighting, killed, wounded, abducted, forced to take sides, and then risk retribution,' said Meenakshi Ganguly, senior South Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch.
   Six months ago, Maoists, who say they fight for poor farmers, took control of Lalgarh, a four-hour drive from east India's biggest city of Kolkata. They drove away government staff, destroyed buildings and forced police to retreat.
   It was a takeover seen across hundreds of rural districts across a 'red corridor' in central and eastern India.
    'It is not a question of patrolling anymore. It is a question of engaging them, arresting them and killing them if fired upon,' Kuldiep Singh, a senior police official in West Bengal, said.
   It will be a risky task. In Lalgarh, rebels are playing cat and mouse, firing at police camps in surprise attacks.
   The Maoist insurgency has spread to 20 of India's 29 states.

A Pakistani brigadier escaped assassination Friday in the third gun attack targeting army officers in the capital since the military launched a major offensive against the Taliban in the northwest.
   Gunmen travelling on a motorbike shot the brigadier and his driver at close range in the ordinarily peaceful, middle-class neighbourhood of I-8 on the outskirts of the leafy capital during the morning rush hour, police said.
   There was no claim of responsibility but Pakistan's security establishment has been in the crosshairs of increasingly brazen militant attacks underscoring the extremists' reach in the frontline state of the US-led war on al-Qaeda.
   'Two army officials, including one brigadier, were injured when unknown gunmen opened fire on their vehicle,' Doctor Nasir Ahmad told AFP at the capital's Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences hospital.
   Security officials identified the brigadier as a military intelligence official. Gunmen apparently followed his vehicle after he left his home and opened fire when he was on way to his office, they said.
   'It was around 9:15am. I woke up after hearing sudden gunfire,' said property dealer Amin Chughtai.
   'I thought my house was under attack. I peeped out of my window. People had gathered outside. I was scared. I didn't go out. I found out later that gunmen targeted a vehicle and some people were wounded,' said the 46-year-old.
   Watchman Hakeem Shah said shards of glass littered the street immediately after the attack, but the vehicle was removed and the casualties evacuated.
   Friday's shooting was the third targeting senior army commanders in Islamabad since the military last month put 30,000 troops into battle against Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan in the tribal region of South Waziristan.

Thick fog overcast the sky in many parts of the country in the early hours on Friday, hampering normal life as well as vehicular movement.
   Thousands of long route passengers suffered as ferry operations at Paturia-Daulatdia and Mawa-Char Janajat and at other points of river communication were disrupted by the dense fog.
   The New Age correspondent in Manikganj reports: Dense fog disrupted the ferry communication between Paturia and Dauladia for over seven hours since Friday morning.
   Several hundred vehicles remained stranded on the both sides of Paturia and Dauladia. The communication of the south-western region of the country with the capital city is being seriously hampered. Women, children and patients are the worst sufferers in the situation.
   Deputy general manager of the Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation Abdul Matin told New Age that the service remained suspended from 2:00am to 6:00am and again from 8:30am to 10:00am.
   Four ferries - Anayet Puri, Shah Jalal, Hamidur Rahma and Bir Srastha Matiur Rahman - were stranded at the middle of the river for the hours, he added.
   The New Age Barisal correspondent said dense fog disrupted traffic for hours from early hours of Friday, delaying south and south-western region-bound road transports and causing enormous sufferings to the passengers.
   Thousands of passengers got stranded at ferry crossings of their routes as ferry operations remained disrupted for eight to twelve hours because of dense fog over the river points.
   According to reports received from passengers and drivers of vehicles, road communications between the eastern and the western parts of the River Padma and Arial Kha connecting south and south-western with north and north-eastern regions, remained disrupted for 12 hours.
   Metrological department said foggy weather indicates early winter with cold wave.

At least five persons were killed including three BNP leaders in Faridpur and Bagerhat on Friday.
   Among them district BNP convening committee member Nazrul Islam, 52, Bhanga pourasva ward commissioner and BNP leader Tutul, 45, Hannan, and car driver Mohammad Miraz were killed in Faridpur.
   Saiful Islam, 30, son of Abdul Qader of Tangail was killed in Bagerhat.
   The United News of Bangladesh, quoting the police and witnesses, said four people, including three BNP leaders, were killed when a Dhaka-bound bus from Barisal rammed into a private car at Maligram in Bhanga on the Dhaka-Khulna Highway Friday at about 3:30pm.
   The car got twisted and caught fire after being dashed by the bus, killing all four on the spot.
   On information the police rushed in and recovered the bodies and sent those to hospital morgue.
   The police also seized the bus, but its driver and helper managed to flee.
   In another news, the UNB, quoting the police and witnesses, said Saiful was killed and four others were injured as a Bagerhat-bound private car carrying five people from Tangail hit a roadside tree and plunged into a ditch at about 1:00pm at Pilganga of Fakirhat on Friday.
   Passenger Saiful died on the spot.
   The injured were admitted to Khulna Medical College Hospital and Bagerhat General Hospital in critical condition.

The New Delhi-based Foreign Correspondents Club of South Asia has alleged that the foreign journalists were denied entry to Arunachal province, bordering China, ahead of Dalai Lama's visit there from Sunday.
   In a statement on Thursday the Club expressed its 'disappointment' with the Indian government's travel restrictions as the Tibetan spiritual leader begins a five-day visit to a frontier monastery in the state.
   The Club's president Heather Timmons of the New York Times alleged that the Central government did no issue any permit for foreign journalists to visit Arunachal Pradesh for the Dalai Lama's visit though the state government granted the permission.
   The statement said the foreign journalists trying to cover the visit to Tawang in Arunachal were denied entry and at least three newsmen were sent back from Guwahati last night.
   Agency reports said the Arunachal government, however, denied that foreign journalists were banned there during the Tibetan leader's visit.