Activist blockade hits Bangladesh

Opposition activists have paralysed road and rail links across much of Bangladesh, after calling a nationwide blockade to demand electoral reform.

Thousands demonstrated in the capital, Dhaka, despite a ban on rallies.

The opposition Awami League and its allies called the protest in a bid to force the administration to sack election officials they accuse of bias.

Bangladesh is being run by a caretaker government in the run-up to general elections due in January.

A BBC correspondent in Dhaka says all major towns and cities have been affected by the blockade, as well as the country’s main sea port, Chittagong.

Protesters blocked railway lines and set fire to a train and a bus on the outskirts of Dhaka.

Elsewhere in the city, vehicles which tried to defy the blockade were reportedly set on fire or stoned.

Apart from protesters gathering for rallies, the streets were largely deserted, with many businesses and shops closed, witnesses said.

Disaster warning

Dhaka’s police force said on Saturday it had banned “processions, rallies, demonstrations, sieges, sit-ins and blockades”, as well as the carrying of potential weapons, the Associated Press news agency reports.

The country’s interim government has issued a statement warning of serious consequences if the transport blockade continued.

The action was “anti-constitutional and illegal” and in cutting off the supply of food and medical supplies risked creating a humanitarian disaster, it said.

Business leaders have also urged an end to the blockade, warning it could cost the country millions of dollars a day in lost export earnings.

The 14-party alliance led by the Awami League ordered Sunday’s action after Bangladesh’s chief electoral commissioner and three deputies refused to resign.

The alliance accuses the officials of planning to rig January’s elections in favour of the outgoing government of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia. The commissioners deny the allegations.

More than 20 people were killed in clashes between rival political camps when Ms Zia’s term expired in October.

The country’s figurehead president, Iajuddin Ahmed, assumed control of the government after the political parties failed to agree on who should lead the caretaker administration to oversee January’s vote.

BBC