DHAKA, 27 May 2006 — Paramilitary troops and an elite rapid action unit were deployed at garment factories around Dhaka yesterday to increase security after one person was killed and nearly 150 injured in violent protests earlier this week.
Most of the nearly 300 garment factories vandalized during the violence, triggered by pay disputes, have resumed production but at least half a dozen factories torched in the protests were still shut, textile industry officials said.
The attacks occurred on Monday and Tuesday after one worker was shot dead, possibly by police, at an export zone at Savar, 25 kilometers north of the city. Police said they were still looking for the killer.
Meanwhile, in violence yesterday, five terror suspects were killed in shootouts with personnel of the Rapid Action Battalion. They included a notorious hijacker and a terrorist — Wasim and Zakir — who were killed in Dhaka. In the southeastern Chittagong district, two suspects were killed in another shootout with RAB personnel and one terror suspect was killed in Satkhira district.
President Undergoes Heart Surgery
Bangladesh President Iajuddin Ahmed underwent cardiac surgery at Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore yesterday, the president’s secretariat said in a statement. “The surgery has been successful,” an official said without giving details.
