Bangladesh: Pro-opposition editor arrested for defamation after calling woman-journalist 'characterless'

Hosein was arrested Monday night by the police's Detective Branch.

"We have arrested Barrister Moinul Hosein in compliance with an arrest warrant issued by a court in (northwestern) Rangpur," Joint Commissioner at the Detective Branch, Mahbub Alal said.

Hosein would be kept in police custody overnight at the Detective Branch office to be produced before a court Tuesday for subsequent legal procedures, he said.

The whole case started when on a talk show on October 16 midnight, journalist Masuda Bhatti had asked Hosein if he represented fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami in the newly-floated Unity Front, as being speculated on the social media.

In his reply, Hosein had said, "I thank you for your audacity (in asking the question) and want to call you a characterless (person)."

Hosein had a played a key role in the formation of the recently-floated Unity Front, an alliance between the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and other centrist parties.

He was arrested around 10 pm from the residence of left-leaning opposition politician ASM Abdur Rab of the Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (JSD), which is also a part of the alliance.

Hosein is also a former Chairman of the Board of Editors of the Daily Ittefaq, one of Bangladesh's oldest newspapers.

Earlier, Masuda Bhatti had said Hosein had called her to apologize.

But, his move could help him little to evade a spate of massive disparagement and a series of defamation cases filed by women rights groups and the one lodged by the woman journalist.

Hours ahead of the arrest of Hosein, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina told during a news conference, "Hosein deserved punitive actions for his defamatory comments against a lady colleague of yours."

She also described the news editor an agent of the 1971 Pakistani forces and no less responsible for the killing of martyred journalist Serajuddin Hossain during the 1971 Liberation War.