National mourning turned to anger in Bangladesh yesterday as the death toll from a fighter jet crash into a school in Dhaka jumped to 31, sparking protests by hundreds of students against the interim government in a nation gripped by instability.
At least 25 of the dead were children, many under the age of 12, who were about to return home on Monday when the Chinese-manufactured F-7 BGI Bangladesh Air Force jet plowed into Milestone School and College and burst into flames, trapping pupils in the fire and building debris.
Their fellow students and others from nearby schools protested as two government officials visited the crash site, demanding justice and shouting: “Why did our brothers die? We demand answers.”
Photo: AP
Elsewhere in the capital, hundreds of protesting students, some of them waving sticks, broke through the main gate of the federal government secretariat, demanding the resignation of the education adviser, local TV footage showed.
Police baton charged them and forced them out.
Rescue workers continued to scour the charred buildings for debris as distressed residents of the area looked on. Some parents were inconsolable.
“I took her to school yesterday morning like every day. I had no idea it would be the last time I would be seeing her,” said Abul Hossain, breaking down as he spoke about his nine-year-old daughter, Nusrat Jahan Anika, killed in the crash.
She was buried on Monday night.
Rubina Akter said her son Raiyan Toufiq had a miraculous escape after his shirt caught fire when he was on a staircase.
“He sprinted to the ground floor and jumped on the grass to douse it,” she said. “He tore his shirt and vest inside which saved him from severe burns.”
The jet had taken off from a nearby air base on a routine training mission, the military said, adding that the plane experienced a mechanical failure and the pilot was among those killed. Although he tried to divert the aircraft away from populated areas, the jet crashed into the campus.
The military said in a statement that 31 people had died and 165 had been admitted to hospitals in the city.
The Bangladeshi Ministry of Health and Family Welfare later said that 70 were still receiving treatment.
The government announced a day of mourning, with flags at half-mast and special prayers at all places of worship.
The protesting students called for those killed and injured to be named, for air force compensation to the families of those killed, the decommissioning of what they said were old and risky jets, and a changing of air force training procedures.
The F-7 BGI is the final and most advanced variant in China’s Chengdu J-7/F-7 aircraft family, according to Jane’s Information Group. Bangladesh signed a contract for 16 aircraft in 2011 and deliveries were completed by 2013.
The Chengdu F-7 is a license-built version of the Soviet era MiG-21.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have declared they survived recall votes to remove them from office today, although official results are still pending as the vote counting continues. Although final tallies from the Central Election Commission (CEC) are still pending, preliminary results indicate that the recall campaigns against all seven KMT lawmakers have fallen short. As of 6:10 pm, Taichung Legislators Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), Hsinchu County Legislator Lin Szu-ming (林思銘), Nantou County Legislator Ma Wen-chun (馬文君) and New Taipei City Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) had all announced they
CHAMPIONS: President Lai congratulated the players’ outstanding performance, cheering them for marking a new milestone in the nation’s baseball history Taiwan on Sunday won their first Little League Baseball World Series (LLBWS) title in 29 years, as Taipei’s Dong Yuan Elementary School defeated a team from Las Vegas 7-0 in the championship game in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It was Taiwan’s first championship in the annual tournament since 1996, ending a nearly three-decade drought. “It has been a very long time ... and we finally made it,” Taiwan manager Lai Min-nan (賴敏男) said after the game. Lai said he last managed a Dong Yuan team in at the South Williamsport in 2015, when they were eliminated after four games. “There is
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) yesterday visited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), as the chipmaker prepares for volume production of Nvidia’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) chips. It was Huang’s third trip to Taiwan this year, indicating that Nvidia’s supply chain is deeply connected to Taiwan. Its partners also include packager Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密) and server makers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and Quanta Computer Inc (廣達). “My main purpose is to visit TSMC,” Huang said yesterday. “As you know, we have next-generation architecture called Rubin. Rubin is very advanced. We have now taped out six brand new
POWER PLANT POLL: The TPP said the number of ‘yes’ votes showed that the energy policy should be corrected, and the KMT said the result was a win for the people’s voice The government does not rule out advanced nuclear energy generation if it meets the government’s three prerequisites, President William Lai (賴清德) said last night after the number of votes in favor of restarting a nuclear power plant outnumbered the “no” votes in a referendum yesterday. The referendum failed to pass, despite getting more “yes” votes, as the Referendum Act (公民投票法) states that the vote would only pass if the votes in favor account for more than one-fourth of the total number of eligible voters and outnumber the opposing votes. Yesterday’s referendum question was: “Do you agree that the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant
RSS