Bangladesh lodges protest with India over ousted premier Sheikh Hasina’s activities during her stay in the country

Bangladesh protesters torch family home of ousted PM Sheikh Hasina

Bangladesh on Thursday lodged a protest with India‘s acting envoy saying that “false and fabricated comments” by deposed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina are a “hostile act” against Dhaka, a day after she delivered a virtual address to her supporters from exile in India. The Foreign Ministry asked India “to immediately take appropriate measures, in the spirit of mutual respect and understanding, to stop her from making such false, fabricated and incendiary statements using social media and other communications while she is in India”, an official statement said.

The development comes a day after Hasina’s speech on Wednesday night in which she called upon the countrymen to organize a resistance against the current regime. While she was delivering her speech, a large group of protesters vandalized and set on fire her father and Bangladesh founder Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s residence in Dhaka. Similar cases of arson took place in several places, targeting the Awami League leaders.

In the statement, the Foreign Ministry said it lodged a “strong protest with the Government of India over the false fabricated comments and statements continuously being made in different platforms including social media, by the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, instigating instability in Bangladesh”.

The protest note, handed over to the Acting High Commissioner of India in Dhaka, conveyed the “deep concern, disappointment, and serious reservation” of Bangladesh, as such statements are “hurting the sentiments” of the people in the country, the statement said.

The Ministry also emphasized that such activities by her, are considered as a “hostile act towards Bangladesh and are not conducive to the efforts at establishing a healthy relationship between the two countries”.

Hasina, 77, has been living in Delhi since August 5 last year when she fled Bangladesh following a massive student-led protest that toppled her Awami League’s 16-year regime. “They can demolish a building, but not the history… But they must also remember that history takes its revenge,” Hasina said in her address Wednesday night while her father’s home was being demolished.

“They are yet to have the strength to destroy the national flag, the constitution, and the independence that we earned at the cost of the lives of millions of martyrs with a bulldozer,” Hasina said in an apparent reference to the interim government led by Muhammad Yunus.

Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) has issued arrest warrants for Hasina and several former Cabinet ministers, advisers, and military and civil officials for “crimes against humanity and genocide”. The interim government has already revoked the passports of Hasina and 96 others over their alleged involvement in enforced disappearances and the July killings.

In December, Bangladesh officially sought Hasina’s repatriation to stand trial on charges of mass killings during the Anti-Discrimination Student’s Movement dubbed as the July-August uprising.

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