Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) General Secretary Mirza Islam Alamgir has expressed his party’s desire to strengthen ties with India and stressed that India is considered a neighbour and friend, but also called for resolution of several key issues.
Speaking to news agency ANI, Mr Alamgir said that BNP wants friendly relations with India and wants resolution of these issues to move forward.
Mr Alamgir said, “It will definitely be strengthened further because we as a political party always consider India as our neighbour and friend. But we also invite India to resolve certain issues.”
He said, “We want good friendly relations with India.”
Furthermore, Mr. Alamgir has denied reports of communal atrocities against Hindus in Bangladesh.
Mr Alamgir claimed the issues were “purely political”, not communal or religious. He invited the Indian media to come to Dhaka and assess the situation for themselves.
Referring to the attacks on Hindus in Bangladesh, Mr. Alamgir said, “There is a kind of misunderstanding and very unfortunate propaganda being carried out by various media at the national and global level and particularly in your country. The media is propagating that communal atrocities are taking place in Bangladesh, which is not true at all. This is not communal, not religious, it is purely political to some extent. I invite you, the media of India, to come to Dhaka and see for yourself what has happened in Bangladesh.”
Further, Mr. Alamgir accused the government of running a “political conspiracy” against the interim government and the people.
The BNP general secretary told ANI, “Some people say that the people of Bangladesh are creating some communal problems. No, it is not like that at all. They are safe in the hands of the Bangladeshi government, the Bangladeshi people, they are always safe. This is again a political conspiracy going on against the interim government and the people because people no longer want Sheikh Hasina’s government, which has killed so many people in these few years and destroyed the constitution. They have violated human rights and the corruption was massive and unprecedented.”
Mr Alamgir also spoke about the situation when Sheikh Hasina resigned and fled the country and said she fled to India from Delhi under “special circumstances” following the student and civil uprising.
He said, “Former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has resigned and fled the country, leaving her party and people behind. She should have always been with the people, but she left the country. As far as we know, she is in Delhi. She had to leave the country under special circumstances.”
“There was an uprising of students and citizens. It was a revolution and before that Sheikh Hasina’s police killed about 1,000 students and arrested about 12,000 people… lakhs of people were on the streets and they were marching towards the prime minister’s official residence and then she left the country in her helicopter,” he said.
The political situation in Bangladesh has been volatile since Sheikh Hasina resigned as prime minister amid growing protests on August 5. The protests, which were led by students demanding the abolition of the quota system in government jobs, turned into anti-government protests.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)