Bangladesh rattled by adverse reports in foreign media about the country, Rizvi holds media conference

By Our Correspondent

Agartala, April 2, 2025

The present illegitimate dispensation in Bangladesh as well as opposition BNP seem to be rattled by increasingly strident criticism of the society and politics of the country in foreign, specially US media. It was on Monday last, that is March 31, that the New York Times (NYT), one of most influential newspapers in the world , had carried a report expressing grave concern over the recent spurt in socio-religious extremism in country over the past eight months-that is , since forcible seizure of power by the present regime on August 5 last year. The report cited instances of targeted minority persecution, ban imposed by a fundamentalist group on women playing football as well as the snatching of a rape-accused from police custody by a mob.

Stung by the adverse criticism in an influential US media, the opposition BNP’s loose cannon leader Ruhul Kavir Rizvi took up cudgels on behalf of the illegitimate government, describing such ‘planted reports’ as a conspiracy by the Awami League. “The Awami League leaders who let loose a reign of fascist terror in the country for long fifteen years are flush with ill-begotten money which they are using for the smear campaign against Bangladesh in foreign media”, said Rizvi in an interaction with the media in the BNP party headquarter in Dhaka. He also played down the deteriorating law and order situation in the country over which even the army chief Wakar-Uj-Zaman- had expressed displeasure,saying small incidents had happened initially but things are now quiet.

Meanwhile, the Information and Broadcasting advisor Md Mahfuz Alam who is known to have deep connection with the banned terrorist outfit ‘Hizbut Tahrir’ took a more restrained stance vis-à-vis the report that had appeared in the New York Times. He said that the interim government will not allow anyone to take advantage of the transitional situation to create terror and sponsor militancy. Mahfuz Alam asserted that the interim government’s priority is peace and normalcy in the country and holding of free and democratic elections after reforms.

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