Military in control of Bangladesh after Hasina flees

Military in control of Bangladesh after Hasina flees
People celebrate the resignation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on August 5, 2024. (REUTERS)
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Updated 06 August 2024
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Military in control of Bangladesh after Hasina flees

Military in control of Bangladesh after Hasina flees
  • Hasina stepped down as PM after violent protests in Bangladesh claimed at least 300 lives since last month 
  • Protesters stormed parliament, torched TV stations while some smashed statues of Hasina’s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman

DHAKA: Bangladesh’s military was in control of the country on Tuesday after mass protests forced longtime ruler Sheikh Hasina to resign and flee.

Hasina, 76, had been in power since 2009 but was accused of rigging elections in January and then watched millions of people take to the streets over the past month demanding she step down.

Hundreds of people died as security forces sought to quell the unrest, but the protests grew and Hasina finally fled Bangladesh aboard a helicopter on Monday as the military turned against her.

Army chief General Waker-Uz-Zaman announced Monday afternoon on state television that Hasina had resigned and the military would form a caretaker government.

“The country has suffered a lot, the economy has been hit, many people have been killed — it is time to stop the violence,” said Waker, shortly after jubilant crowds stormed and looted Hasina’s official residence.

Millions of Bangladeshis flooded the streets of Dhaka after Waker’s announcement.

“I feel so happy that our country has been liberated,” said Sazid Ahnaf, 21, comparing the events to the independence war that split the nation from Pakistan more than five decades ago.

“We have been freed from a dictatorship. It’s a Bengal uprising, what we saw in 1971, and now seeing in 2024.”

But there were also scenes of chaos and anger, with police reporting at least 66 people killed on Monday as mobs launched revenge attacks on Hasina’s allies.

Protesters stormed parliament and torched TV stations, while some smashed statues of Hasina’s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the country’s independence hero.

Others set a museum dedicated to the former leader on fire, flames licking at portraits in destruction barely thinkable just hours before, when Hasina had the loyalty of the security forces under her autocratic grip.

“The time has come to make them accountable for torture,” said protester Kaza Ahmed. “Sheikh Hasina is responsible for murder.”

Offices of Hasina’s Awami League across the country were torched and looted, eyewitnesses told AFP.

The unrest began last month in the form of protests against civil service job quotas and then escalated into wider calls for Hasina to stand down.

Her government was accused by rights groups of misusing state institutions to entrench its hold on power and stamp out dissent, including through the extrajudicial killing of opposition activists.

At least 366 people died in the unrest that began in early July, according to an AFP tally based on police, government officials and doctors at hospitals.

Student protest leaders, ahead of an expected meeting with the army chief, said Tuesday that they wanted Nobel laureate and microfinance pioneer Muhammad Yunus, 84, to lead the government.

“In Dr. Yunus, we trust,” Asif Mahmud, a key leader of the Students Against Discrimination (SAD) group, wrote on Facebook.

Waker said a curfew would be lifted on Tuesday morning, with the military set to lead an interim government.

Bangladeshi President Mohammed Shahabuddin late Monday ordered the release of prisoners from the protests, as well as former prime minister and key opposition leader Khaleda Zia, 78.

Zia, who is in poor health, was jailed by her arch-rival Hasina for graft in 2018.

The president and army chief also met late Monday, alongside key opposition leaders, with the president’s press team saying it had been “decided to form an interim government immediately.”

It was not immediately clear if Waker would lead it.

Hasina’s fate was also uncertain. She fled the country by helicopter, a source close to the ousted leader told AFP.

Media in neighboring India reported Hasina had landed at a military air base near New Delhi.

A top-level source said she wanted to “transit” on to London, but calls by the British government for a UN-led investigation into “unprecedented levels of violence” put that into doubt.

There were widespread calls by protesters to ensure Hasina’s close allies remained in the country.

Bangladesh’s military said they had shut Dhaka’s international airport on Monday evening, without giving a reason.

Bangladesh has a long history of coups.

The military declared an emergency in January 2007 after widespread political unrest and installed a military-backed caretaker government for two years.

Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Washington-based Wilson Center, warned that Hasina’s departure “would leave a major vacuum” and that the country was in “uncharted territory.”

“The coming days are critical,” he said.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stressed the importance of a “peaceful, orderly and democratic transition,” his spokesman said. European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell echoed that call.

Former colonial ruler Britain and the United States meanwhile urged “calm.”


Armenian prime minister says peace with Azerbaijan ‘within reach’

Armenian prime minister says peace with Azerbaijan ‘within reach’
Updated 39 sec ago
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Armenian prime minister says peace with Azerbaijan ‘within reach’

Armenian prime minister says peace with Azerbaijan ‘within reach’
  • Azeri troops seized last year the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, forcing its entire population of nearly 120,000 people to flee to Armenia
  • Facing a weaker hand and the lack of intervention by Armenia’s historic ally Russia, Pashinyan sued for peace but faced protests from nationalists at home

UNITED NATIONS: Armenia’s prime minister said Thursday that peace with Azerbaijan was “within reach,” appealing to his neighbor to sign a treaty to turn the page on decades of conflict.
Exactly a year after Azerbaijan triumphed in a lightning military offensive, Armenia promised to meet a key demand of its historic rival: to ensure travel links.
“Today I want to say that peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan not only is possible, but is within reach,” Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in an address to the United Nations General Assembly.
“All we need to do is reach out and take it,” he said.
“The pain is very deep and intense, but we must now focus on peace, because peace is the only truth understandable to the people of Armenia and Azerbaijan,” he said.
The two former Soviet republics had seen decades of war and tension over Nagorno-Karabakh, a breakaway ethnic Armenian region in Azerbaijan.
After a series of slow-moving negotiations, Azerbaijan rushed in troops last year and swiftly seized back Nagorno-Karabakh, whose entire population of nearly 120,000 people fled to Armenia.
Facing a weaker hand and the lack of intervention by Armenia’s historic ally Russia, Pashinyan has insisted on the need for peace but faced protests from nationalists opposed to compromise.
In his UN address, Pashinyan said he was ready to meet the Baku government’s key demand of allowing transportation access across Armenian soil to the exclave of Nakhchivan, letting Azerbaijan connect its main territory with its traditional ally Turkiye.
“The Republic of Armenia is ready to fully ensure the safety of the passage of cargo vehicles and people on its territory. It is our wish, our commitment, and we can do it,” Pashinyan said, saying it could become a “crossroads of peace.”

Map of Armenia and Azerbaijan showing the areas controlled by each country during the Soviet era, after the 1994 conflict and after the war in 2020.

Another key sticking point is Azerbaijan’s objections to a section of the Armenian constitution that speaks of uniting with Nagorno-Karabakh.
Pashinyan said that Armenia had its own issues with Azerbaijan’s constitution but that it did not see any obstacle as a peace agreement “solves the problem.”
Azerbaijan and Armenia both say that 80 percent of a treaty is ready, including border delineation, but Azerbaijan first wants a resolution of all issues.
Some diplomats view Azerbaijani strongman Ilham Aliyev’s stance as cynical, considering the difficulty that Pashinyan would have in changing the constitution.
The diplomats say Azerbaijan believes it can afford to wait as it has the clear upper hand, with its wealth from gas, a modernized military bolstered by Turkish weapons, and a rising international profile, with Baku in November the host of the COP29 climate summit.
Pashinyan insisted that Azerbaijan and Armenia should sign the draft treaty immediately, explaining, “There is no precedent of a peace agreement or any agreement that would regulate and solve everything.”
A treaty and diplomatic relations would improve “the overall atmosphere” between the two countries, which will “significantly facilitate the solution of the remaining issues,” Pashinyan said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met the two countries’ foreign ministers on Thursday in New York.
Blinken “encouraged continued progress by both countries to finalize an agreement as soon as possible,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said.
 


Kenya set for full Haiti deployment amid call for shift to UN mission

Kenya set for full Haiti deployment amid call for shift to UN mission
Updated 3 min 58 sec ago
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Kenya set for full Haiti deployment amid call for shift to UN mission

Kenya set for full Haiti deployment amid call for shift to UN mission

UNITED NATIONS: Kenya is aiming to complete its full deployment of a stabilization force in violence-torn Haiti by January, President William Ruto said Thursday, as Haiti’s leader suggested making it a UN peacekeeping mission.

The three-month-old security force to combat spiraling insecurity in the Caribbean nation is currently a Kenyan-led multinational policing operation, and changing it into a UN-mandated force would require a Security Council vote.

“Kenya will deploy the additional contingent toward attaining the target of all the 2,500 police officers by January next year,” Ruto said in a speech to the UN General Assembly.

“Kenya and other Caribbean and African countries are ready to deploy, but are hindered by insufficient equipment, logistics and funding,” he said.

Ruto called on member states to “stand in solidarity with the people of Haiti by providing necessary support.”

Criminal gangs control more than 80 percent of the capital Port-au-Prince, as well as key roads around the country.

Edgard Leblanc Fils, the head of Haiti’s transitional council, told the General Assembly Thursday he “would like to see a thought being given to transforming the security support mission into a peacekeeping mission under the mandate of the United Nations.”

Leblanc Fils said that such a change would allow for the challenge of funding the mission to be resolved, while helping “to strengthen the commitment of member states to security in Haiti.”

“I am convinced that this change of status, whilst recognizing that the errors of the past cannot be repeated, would guarantee the full success of the mission in Haiti,” he said.

The United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, which deployed from 2004 to 2017, was tarnished by accusations of sexual abuse by peacekeepers and the force’s accidental introduction of cholera, which killed some 10,000 people.

The United States has also backed consideration of putting the new force under the UN flag to ensure a predictable source of funding.

But the move faces daunting odds in the Security Council, where China and Russia hold veto power.

A draft UN Security Council resolution extending the mandate of the security mission contains a call “to consider” transforming the deployment into a UN-mandated peacekeeping mission.

It is due to be debated Monday.

Haitian interim prime minister Garry Conille warned Wednesday that “we’re nowhere near winning this” as he stressed the battle against the gangs would not be successful without outside help.

The United States announced on Wednesday $160 million of new aid for Haiti, bringing the amount of US aid to the troubled Caribbean country to $1.3 billion since 2021.

Leblanc Fils said his country still needed “much more in terms of personnel and also equipment to be able to solve the security problems and allow elections to take place.”

Washington on Wednesday also announced sanctions against two Haitians linked to the country’s powerful gangs.


Florida bracing for ‘unsurvivable’ Hurricane Helene

Florida bracing for ‘unsurvivable’ Hurricane Helene
Updated 11 min 15 sec ago
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Florida bracing for ‘unsurvivable’ Hurricane Helene

Florida bracing for ‘unsurvivable’ Hurricane Helene

A powerful hurricane was barreling toward Florida on Thursday, with officials warning of “unsurvivable” conditions and a potentially catastrophic storm surge high enough to swamp a two-story house.

Tens of thousands of people were without power and roads were already flooded ahead of what is expected to be one of the largest Gulf of Mexico storms in decades.

Fast-moving Helene strengthened to an “extremely dangerous” Category 4 hurricane Thursday evening, ahead of landfall expected around 11pm (0300 GMT), the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.

It was packing winds of 130 miles (215 kilometers) per hour as it churned over the Gulf’s warm waters toward the Big Bend area south of Florida’s capital city Tallahassee.

“EVERYONE along the Florida Big Bend coast is at risk of potentially catastrophic storm surge,” the NHC said on social media.

Tampa and Tallahassee airports have closed, with parts of St. Petersburg, downtown Tampa, Sarasota, Treasure Island and other cities on Florida’s west coast already flooded.

About 125,000 homes and businesses were without power.

“We’re expecting to see a storm surge inundation of 15 to 20 feet above ground level,” NHC director Mike Brennan said. “That’s up to the top of a second story building. Again, a really unsurvivable scenario is going to play out here in this portion of the Florida coastline.”

The accompanying waves “can destroy houses, move cars, and that water level is going to rise very quickly,” Brennan added.

In Alligator Point, a coastal town on a picturesque peninsula in the storm’s path, David Wesolowski was taking no chances.

“I just came to button up a few things before it gets too windy,” the 37-year-old real estate agent told AFP as he boarded up his house on stilts.

“If it stays on course, this is going to look different afterwards, that’s for sure,” he said, before taking his family to higher ground in Tallahassee.

Meanwhile, Patrick Riickert refused to budge from his small wooden house in Crawfordville, a town of 5,000 people a few miles inland.

As in Alligator Point, most residents have bolted and it looked like a ghost town, but Riickert, his wife and five grandchildren were “not going anywhere,” the 58-year-old insisted.

“I am going to hunker down” and ride out the hurricane, as he did in 2018 when deadly Hurricane Michael, a Category 5 megastorm, blew through the Florida panhandle.

The NHC warned of up to 20 inches (51 cm) of rain in some spots, and potentially life-threatening flooding as well as numerous landslides across the southern Appalachians.

The National Weather Service said the region could be hit extremely hard, with floods not seen in more than a century.

“This will be one of the most significant weather events to happen in the western portions of the area in the modern era,” it warned.

Tornado warnings went out across northern Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas.

Georgia’s sprawling capital Atlanta was forecast to experience tropical storm-force winds and flash flooding from up to 12 inches of rain.

And Tennessee — more than 300 miles from the Gulf Coast — braced for tropical storm conditions statewide.

More than 55 million Americans were under some form of weather alert or warning from Hurricane Helene.

“This is going to be a multi-state event with the potential for significant impacts from Florida all the way to Tennessee,” Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator Deanne Criswell told reporters.

Vice President Kamala Harris said the White House was watching.

“The President and I, of course, are monitoring the case and the situation closely, and we urge everyone who is watching at this very moment to take this storm very seriously,” she told reporters.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis mobilized the National Guard and ordered thousands of personnel to ready for search-and-rescue operations.

He warned that the powerful storm would be dangerous, and urged everyone to take precautions.

“We can’t control how strong this hurricane is going to get. We can’t control the track of the hurricane, but what you can control is what you can do to put yourself in the best chance to be able to ride this out in a way that’s going to be safe.”

Helene could become the most powerful hurricane to hit the United States in over a year — and almost certainly the biggest.

Hurricane specialist Michael Lowry called Helene “extreme,” noting its tropical storm winds of 39 mph or higher stretched nearly 500 miles across.

Researchers say climate change likely plays a role in the rapid intensification of hurricanes, because there is more energy in warmer oceans for them to feed on.


Minority wing of Moldovan Orthodox church accuses priests of lobbying against Europe vote

Minority wing of Moldovan Orthodox church accuses priests of lobbying against Europe vote
Updated 19 min 24 sec ago
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Minority wing of Moldovan Orthodox church accuses priests of lobbying against Europe vote

Minority wing of Moldovan Orthodox church accuses priests of lobbying against Europe vote
  • Religion, like politics, is deeply polarized in ex-Soviet Moldova, split between liberals advocating for closer ties with the EU Romania and conservatives seeking to retain longstanding links with Russia

CHISINAU: The minority pro-Romanian branch of Moldova’s Orthodox Church accused clergy from the rival Moscow-linked branch of the church of campaigning against a referendum asking voters whether they back the government’s drive to join the European Union.
The minority Metropolis of Bessarabia said rival priests were lobbying against pro-European President Maia Sandu’s campaign to join the 27-nation bloc in “profoundly offensive acts ... clearly directed against the spiritual and national unity” of Moldova.

Why it is important
Religion, like politics, is deeply polarized in ex-Soviet Moldova, split between liberals advocating for closer ties with the EU and neighboring Romania and conservatives seeking to retain longstanding links with Russia.
The majority Moldova Metropolis is subordinate to the Russian Orthodox Church, though the number of priests switching to the minority branch has increased because of the Russian church’s backing for Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, Moldova’s eastern neighbor.
With more than 90 percent of Moldovans adhering to Orthodox Christianity, church actions could have a major effect on the Oct. 20 referendum — held alongside a presidential election in which Sandu is seeking a second term.

Key quotes
Statement by the minority Metropolis of Bessarabia:
“Priests are openly involved in election political propaganda ... The Bessarabia Metropolis firmly supports Moldova’s Europe policy which reflects Democratic values and respect for the Church and Christianity.”

President Sandu, earlier in September
“Clergy must not permit themselves to be used to destabilize the country. They must in all things work for peace in our society ... My appeal to clergy is not to get involved in politics and leave citizens to choose what they believe in. Let them teach Christian morals.”

Context
The latest opinion poll puts support for EU membership at 56 percent, with 34 percent opposed. Two of 15 parties registered in the referendum campaign are calling for a “no” vote.


Denial of Palestinian state threatens Israelis, Jews everywhere: European Council president

Denial of Palestinian state threatens Israelis, Jews everywhere: European Council president
Updated 24 min 49 sec ago
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Denial of Palestinian state threatens Israelis, Jews everywhere: European Council president

Denial of Palestinian state threatens Israelis, Jews everywhere: European Council president
  • Charles Michel calls for ‘immediate ceasefire’ in Gaza, two-state solution
  • Conflict in Sudan a ‘huge humanitarian catastrophe,’ he tells UN General Assembly

NEW YORK CITY: The continued denial of a state for the Palestinian people threatens the security of Israelis and Jews everywhere, the European Council president told the UN General Assembly on Thursday.

Charles Michel said the EU is working hard toward achieving an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, and Israel’s security cannot come at the cost of regional peace.

“We want an immediate ceasefire in accordance with the order of the International Court of Justice. The EU is working for a lasting peace within the framework of a two-state solution living freely side by side and in safety,” he added.

“Freedom and solidarity — it’s under these same principles that we condemn the abominable terrorist attacks by Hamas (on Oct. 7 last year).

“Israel has the right to defend itself in accordance with international law and within the principle of proportionality, but ensuring security while neglecting peace is an illusion. There will never be lasting security without peace.

“The Palestinian people have the right to their state. Denying them this right will indefinitely fuel threats to the security of Israelis and of Jews everywhere.”

Remaining on the topic of regional crises, Michel called the conflict in Sudan a “huge humanitarian catastrophe.”

He said the EU will continue its efforts to pressure the warring parties in the country and those who support them to respect humanitarian and international law.