Police and demonstrators clashed yesterday as a nationwide strike called by opposition parties demanding electoral reforms brought much of the country to a standstill.
In the Mahakhali area of the capital Dhaka police baton-charged around 150 protesters after they pelted officers with stones, Sub-Inspector Anam ul Hoque said.
Shops, private offices, schools and colleges were closed and cars were off the roads across the country, officials said.
The 36-hour national strike, beginning at dawn yesterday, follows a mass protest in the capital Dhaka on Sunday.
It is the latest in a series of demonstrations by an alliance of 14 opposition parties led by the main opposition Awami League.
About 10,000 police and paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles troopers were on stand-by in the capital, Dhaka police chief Mizanur Rahman said.
Regional cities were also at a halt.
"Inter-district [transport] has been snapped for buses and trucks and the city streets are empty," said Rajshahi metropolitan police commissioner Mohammad Naeme Ahmed, adding that 500 extra police had been deployed in the city.
In southeastern Chittagong, the country's second-biggest city, 3,500 extra police were deployed and deliveries from the port were suspended.
"Port activities are carrying on inside the port but nothing is being transported from the port today," Chittagong police commissioner Majedul Hoque said.
The Awami League has threatened to call indefinite strikes and boycott the next parliamentary election, scheduled for January next year, if its demands for electoral reforms are not met.
"We will never allow the election to be held unless the existing electoral system is reformed and the chief election commissioner and his two deputies are removed," Awami League general secretary Abdul Jalil said earlier.
The party accuses the three officials of being pro-government.
They also want key officials in the caretaker government, which oversees the elections, to be appointed with the consent of all political parties.
The present system under which the officials are selected by the outgoing government could lead to electoral manipulation, according to the Awami League.
Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party leads a four-party Islamist-allied coalition government. The caretaker government is due to take over in October.
On Monday, Britain's high commissioner expressed "grave concerns" about an increase in the level of politically motivated violence in the lead-up to the elections.
Anwar Chourdhury said personal security for genuine protesters, activists, leaders and the media was a fundamental right and urged all parties to shun violence and observe the rule of law.
Last year the Awami League and its allies called 18 nationwide shutdowns despite pleas from aid donors and business groups who say the strikes cost the impoverished nation's economy tens of millions of dollars annually.
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