'You're killing me': 30 Bangladeshi journalists rescued from burning office
What's the story
The death of Sharif Osman Hadi, a 32-year-old youth leader in Bangladesh, has sparked violent protests in Dhaka. Hadi was a youth leader and a candidate in upcoming elections. He was shot while campaigning in Dhaka by a masked attacker on a motorcycle on December 12 and later succumbed to his injuries in a hospital in Singapore on December 18. After his death, supporters vandalized and set fire to the offices of major newspapers The Daily Star and Prothom Alo.
Rescue efforts
Journalists trapped as flames engulf newsrooms
As the protests intensified, journalists and staff members were trapped inside the burning buildings. Zyma Islam, a reporter for The Daily Star, posted a distress message on Facebook saying, "I can't breathe anymore... You are killing me." Firefighters and army personnel later rescued at least 25 journalists from The Daily Star office. The fire was brought under control around 2:00am. According to bdnews24, the Army has been deployed in front of the Daily Star building.
Widespread unrest
Protests spread beyond media houses
Nurul Kabir, President of the Editors' Council and New Age Editor, was heckled. A video showed a mob ripping Kabir's hair and assaulting him. The unrest also spread to other parts of Dhaka, with protesters blocking key highways and attacking the residence of a former minister. They also vandalized Chhayanaut, a center devoted to Bengali culture. Student groups like Jatiya Chhatra Shakti and National Citizen Party (NCP), joined the demonstrations.
Demands
'We are in a war'
They chanted anti-India slogans, claiming Hadi's assailants fled to India following the murder. They asked the interim administration to close the Indian High Commission until they were returned. "The interim government, until India returns assassins of Hadi Bhai, the Indian High Commission to Bangladesh will remain closed. Now or Never. We are in a war!" an NCP leader said. The Chhatra Shakti burned an effigy of the home adviser and demanded his resignation for failing to apprehend Hadi's killers.
Diplomatic tensions
India-Bangladesh relations strained amid unrest
The current situation in Bangladesh poses the "greatest strategic challenge" for India since the Liberation war of 1971, a parliamentary standing committee on external affairs in India warned. "While the challenge in 1971 was existential, a humanitarian and a birth of a new nation, the latter was of a graver, a generational discontinuity, a shift of political order, and a potential strategic realignment away from India," the committee has said.