Protesters storm Bangladesh dailies after activist dies
Angry protesters stormed the offices of two leading Bangladeshi newspapers following news from Singapore about the death of a leading activist in the 2024 political uprising in Bangladesh.
A mob set fire to a newspaper’s building on Thursday, trapping journalists and other staff inside.
Sharif Osman Hadi, spokesman for the Inqilab Moncho cultural group, died in the hospital in Singapore early in the evening after losing his fight for life for a week.
He was shot while riding a rickshaw in the streets of Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, last Friday. Two men on a motorcycle followed Hadi and one shot him before he fled the scene. After receiving treatment for days in Dhaka, he was flown to Singapore in critical condition.
Authorities said they had identified the suspects and that the shooter likely fled to India; The remarks sparked a new diplomatic row with India and led New Delhi to summon Bangladesh’s envoy this week to express its condemnation. Bangladesh also summoned the Indian envoy to Dhaka and sought clarification.
Hadi has harshly criticized both neighboring India and former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, whose 15-year rule in Bangladesh ended with last year’s uprising.
Witnesses and media reports said hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Dhaka immediately after news of Hadi’s death, gathering in Shahbagh Square near the Dhaka University campus, with many chanting slogans such as Allahu Akbar or God is Great in Arabic. Similar protests took place elsewhere in the country.
Later, a group of protesters gathered outside the head office of Prothom Alo, the country’s leading Bengali daily newspaper, in Dhaka’s Karwan Bazar district. They then burst into the building, according to online portals of various leading media outlets.
A few hundred meters away, another group of protesters entered the building of the country’s leading English-language newspaper, the Daily Star, and set it on fire, according to footage from another mainstream newspaper, Kaler Kantha.
Soldiers and paramilitary border guards were stationed outside the two buildings but took no action to disperse the protesters. As firefighters reached the scene outside the Daily Star building, security guards tried to persuade them to leave peacefully.
The attack on Hadi is still under investigation, but the attack has sparked tensions. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have recently expressed concern about human rights violations in Bangladesh.
