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Bangladeshi housewife set ablaze by husband, in-laws

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Dhaka (The Daily Star/ANN) - A 28-year-old Bangladeshi mother of two daughters is writhing in a hospital bed with most of her body burnt and wrapped in bandages.

Mousumi Akhter Sumi was set ablaze allegedly by her husband and in-laws yesterday at their house at Krishnapur of Comilla sadar for protesting against her husband's extramarital affairs.

Sumi is now fighting for life with 95 percent of her body burnt, said doctors at Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH).

Mousumi and her husband Abul Bashar Sujon got into a fight around 9:30am, Ashiqur Rahman, the victim's brother, told The Daily Star.

At one stage, Sujon collected petrol from his motorbike, poured it on her and set her alight with the help of his mother and sister, Ashiq claimed.

Locals rescued Sumi and admitted her to a local hospital. Later, her family members moved her to the burn unit of DMCH, he added.

Ashiq said their father had helped Sujon to go to Saudi Arabia for work. Sujon returned home three months ago and engaged in an affair with a neighbour, leading to fights between the couple.

The couple have been married for six years, he added.

Officer-in-Charge of Comilla South Police Station Jasimuddin said Sumi's father filed a case accusing five members of the family who were now on the run.

Dhaka (The Daily Star/ANN) - Four vehicles were torched in different parts of the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka yesterday on the eve of two back-to-back shutdowns called by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP)-led 18-party alliance protesting the disappearance of former lawmaker M Ilias Ali.

Police said a group of four to five youths set fire to a bus of Gazipur-Azimpur route after pouring petrol on it at New Market intersection yesterday around 4:00 pm.

AKM Azizul Haque, officer-in-charge of Lalbagh Police Station, told The Daily Star, the passengers rushed out of the bus and no injuries were reported.

A microbus was set ablaze in Fakirapool area around 7:00 pm, said Kazi Abdullah Al Mahmood, an assistant sub-inspector of Paltan Police Station. It could not be known who carried out the arson.

Fire service sources said another microbus was set afire near Shewrapara bus stop around 8:45 pm.

Some unidentified persons set fire to a taxi cab near Mirpur Ansar Camp around 9:10 pm.

The main opposition BNP yesterday afternoon called the countrywide hartal for today and tomorrow.

Earlier on Tuesday, BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia issued a four-day ultimatum to the government to locate Ilias Ali and his driver, or her party would go for tougher agitation.

Ilias Ali, an organising secretary of the party, along with the driver has been out of trace since early hours of April 18.

Alleging that one of the government agencies picked him up, BNP enforced dawn-to-dusk hartals on April 22, 23 and 24.

Meanwhile, the Dhaka district administration deployed 10 mobile courts across the city from yesterday evening to check violence before and during the shutdowns.

Ten mobile courts headed by executive magistrates have started their work at 6:00 pm, Muhibul Haque, deputy commissioner of Dhaka district, said.

Shahbag police said some miscreants around 7:00 pm yesterday tried to torch a staff bus of Jahangirnagar University in front of the Shishu Park. The passengers of the bus caught one the miscreants and handed him over to police.

Later a mobile court sentenced him to a term in jail for three months.

Clinton set to fly into new political storm in Bangladesh Another news 39e5a581e38d

DHAKA (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton may be forced to walk her second diplomatic tightrope in a week when she lands in Bangladesh on Saturday, with Dhaka lurching towards its worst period of political tension in years.

Her trip will be one of the few visits in recent years by senior U.S. officials to Bangladesh, and comes after relations between Washington and the poverty-stricken South Asia nation hit a rare chill.

Fresh from a diplomatic nightmare in China, where U.S. officials have faced the dilemma of how to deal with prominent activist Chen Guangcheng, Clinton will have to tread carefully again during her 24-hour visit to Dhaka.

Political volatility has become the norm in Bangladesh, where Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her arch-rival Begum Khaleda Zia - they are known as the "battling Begums" - have fought over the premiership for decades.

Clinton is due to meet Hasina and other senior government officials, as well as opposition leader Khaleda, barely two weeks after Khaleda's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) staged two countrywide general strikes that lasted five days in all.

Her visit was originally planned for early last year but was put back, apparently over Washington's displeasure with the removal of Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus from Bangladesh's pioneering micro lender, Grameen Bank.

"This visit is significant because an earlier visit was postponed over the Yunus issue," Delwar Hossain, professor of International Relations at Dhaka University, told Reuters.

"Now it seems that the stalemate is over."

Regardless, Clinton will still land amid simmering tensions after the strike, called in protest against the mysterious disappearance of a former BNP lawmaker.

Khaleda's BNP and Hasina's Awami League party have accused each other of abducting former lawmaker Ilyas Ali. Five people were killed in clashes between police and protesters during the strikes, three of whom were shot dead, the worst violence in the past three years of Hasina's rule.

Ali disappeared last month, his abandoned car and mobile phone found by police near his home. Hasina's government has ordered a probe but police deny BNP charges that they were involved in his disappearance.

The BNP says it wants Ali returned safe and well or it will turn the protests into a single-issue movement aimed at forcing the government to step down and have new elections called.

Hasina shows no sign of relenting to the BNP's demands, with the next elections not due until the end of 2013.

Clinton is expected to bring up the harassment of opposition figures, the disappearance of political leaders and human rights violations, and may press for a return to a system where elections were held under a non-party caretaker administration.

OPPOSITION PLEDGES NO DISRUPTIONS

Bangladesh has lagged behind the region in economic growth, partly because of its history of political instability since independence in 1971, and analysts fear that more unrest could derail its ambition to become a middle-income country by 2021.

Yunus, an economics professor who set up Grameen Bank decades ago, was made to quit his post as managing director supposedly because he had stayed in the job until he was 70, 10 years longer than the legally mandated age for it.

Yunus' friends at home and abroad described the move as a political vendetta by the government against what it saw as a potential future challenger to Hasina.

Known around the world as the banker to the poor, Yunus is also a family friend of the Clintons and he is expected to meet Clinton in Dhaka, although that has not been confirmed.

Bangladesh's foreign ministry and the U.S. embassy in Dhaka said details of Clinton's visit are still being worked out. The opposition has said it will not do anything that could derail Clinton's visit.

"We would not go ahead with any programme that could hinder Clinton's stay," senior BNP leader Moudud Ahmed said.

Officials said other issues to be discussed include boosting trade with the United States, strategic collaboration to tackle militancy in South Asia and elsewhere, and energy cooperation.

Analysts say a U.S. secretary of state visit will itself be a big boost for Hasina's government, which is struggling to keep voters happy and deliver on election promises.

"The visit will depict the importance of Bangladesh in the external world because she will also visit India and China. This is a great diplomatic success for the government," Dhaka University's Hossain said.

Bangladesh will also seek more U.S. help for its struggling economy and to battle poverty through additional investment and quota-free access for goods to U.S. markets. In January, Washington said it would provide close to $1 billion in aid for Bangladesh over the next five years.

Washington wants Dhaka to sign a Trade and Investment Cooperation Forum Agreement and a strategic partnership.

(Additional reporting by Serajul Quadir; Editing by Paul Tait)