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Khaleda sees poll sabotage plot

Haroon Habib

Opposition parties to lay siege to the Prime Minister's Office in Dhaka today

DHAKA: Bangladesh Prime Minister Khaleda Zia has alleged that vested interests are hatching a conspiracy to sabotage the upcoming elections, and vowed to thwart all the "conspiracies". "Internal and external conspiracies are going on so that the caretaker Government would not be able to hold a free, fair and neutral election," she told a public meeting on the outskirts of Dhaka on Sunday.

Crackdown

"However strong the domestic and external conspirators may be, we will give them a befitting reply" she said, urging the people to remain alert about the "conspirators." She also announced that her Government would hand over power to the caretaker administration at the end of October and the election process would be completed by January next.

Sounding a note of confidence, Ms. Zia said her four-party alliance would again win two-thirds majority in Parliament.

Meanwhile, the Government launched a countrywide crackdown on one of the largest NGOs in Bangladesh, Proshika, ahead of the Opposition programme to lay siege to the Prime Minister's Office on Tuesday. The Opposition's programmes are aimed at pressing their demand for reforms to the Election Commission and the caretaker government system, which the Government has refused to carry out.

The crackdown on the Proshika staff was launched allegedly in suspicion of its plan to send a large number of people to Dhaka to take part in the siege programme. Proshika alleged that law enforcers had arrested more than 100 officials of the organisation from different parts of the country. Police officials, however, said the NGO staff were arrested for their "anti-Government activities."

Staff interrogated

An official said the police had received a written order from the Government for arresting persons engaged in "anti-state activities."

A Prosikha official said, "Everyone was arrested without warrants. We just guess from the line of interrogation by the police of the arrestees that the crackdown was launched suspecting that Proshika's staff will join the Opposition programmes in Dhaka".

The Government had launched a similar crackdown on Proshika in 2004. Many officials of the NGO, including its chief Qazi Faruque Ahmed were arrested. At least 20 cases were filed against Mr. Ahmed.

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