Police in Bangladesh yesterday continued interrogating detainees believed connected to a series of more than 100 small bomb blasts across the predominantly Muslim country that killed two people and wounded 125 others.
The homemade bombs -- many packed only with sawdust and planted outside government offices or courthouses -- were apparently intended to cause limited damage, authorities said.
"We are working hard and our investigation is moving positively," Dhaka Metropolitan police official Mohammed Mazharul said. "We are adequately alert and have put necessary security measures in the capital."
Fifty suspects were arrested on Wednesday just hours after the near-simultaneous bombings rocked the country, the state-run news agency, Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha, reported.
A bicycle-rickshaw driver and a 10-year-old boy were killed in separate blasts, and at least 125 people were injured. Most of the wounded were believed to have suffered minor burns, the news agency said.
No claims of responsibility were made, but leaflets from a banned Islamic group -- the Jumatul Mujahedin -- were found at the scene of all the explosions, officials said. The group wants to establish an Islamic state in Bangladesh, an overwhelmingly Muslim nation governed by secular laws.
In recent years, several small militant Islamic groups advocating Islamic rule have sprung up in Bangladesh, mostly in the impoverished northern and southern regions. A number of those groups have been blamed by the government for a spate of bomb attacks, killings, robberies, extortion and harassment of villagers.
A bomb that exploded in the High Court's parking lot in the capital Dhaka on Wednesday slightly injured two people, a police officer working at the time said.
"I heard a loud bang from the car park, and there was saw dust everywhere," officer Mrinal Kanti Tripura said.
Police later recovered a homemade bomb hidden inside a small box and cushioned with saw dust in the parking lot, which is used by judges, Tripura said.
Bangladesh's media expressed concern over the attacks yesterday and demanded that the government find the culprits.
"Each one of us in the country -- government, opposition, or neutral -- must today unite behind our common purpose to root out the terrorists and defend our democracy from this unprecedented assault," the Daily Star newspaper said in an editorial.
Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, who left for China before the explosions, described the attacks as a "cowardly, conspiratorial and well-planned terrorist act," the United News of Bangladesh quoted Zia as saying from Beijing.
A new online voting system aimed at boosting turnout among the Philippines’ millions of overseas workers ahead of Monday’s mid-term elections has been marked by confusion and fears of disenfranchisement. Thousands of overseas Filipino workers have already cast their ballots in the race dominated by a bitter feud between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and his impeached vice president, Sara Duterte. While official turnout figures are not yet publicly available, data from the Philippine Commission on Elections (COMELEC) showed that at least 134,000 of the 1.22 million registered overseas voters have signed up for the new online system, which opened on April 13. However,
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
ALLIES: Calling Putin his ‘old friend,’ Xi said Beijing stood alongside Russia ‘in the face of the international counter-current of unilateralism and hegemonic bullying’ Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday was in Moscow for a state visit ahead of the Kremlin’s grand Victory Day celebrations, as Ukraine accused Russia’s army of launching air strikes just hours into a supposed truce. More than 20 foreign leaders were in Russia to attend a vast military parade today marking 80 years since the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, taking place three years into Russia’s offensive in Ukraine. Putin ordered troops into Ukraine in February 2022 and has marshaled the memory of Soviet victory against Nazi Germany to justify his campaign and rally society behind the offensive,
CONFLICTING REPORTS: Beijing said it was ‘not familiar with the matter’ when asked if Chinese jets were used in the conflict, after Pakistan’s foreign minister said they were The Pakistan Army yesterday said it shot down 25 Indian drones, a day after the worst violence between the nuclear-armed rivals in two decades. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif vowed to retaliate after India launched deadly missile strikes on Wednesday morning, escalating days of gunfire along their border. At least 45 deaths were reported from both sides following Wednesday’s violence, including children. Pakistan’s military said in a statement yesterday that it had “so far shot down 25 Israeli-made Harop drones” at multiple location across the country. “Last night, India showed another act of aggression by sending drones to multiple locations,” Pakistan military spokesman Ahmed
RSS