মুহাম্মদ ইউনূস বক্তব্য রাখছেন। ২০১৮।  ফটো: আলামি এই বাংলা লেখাটি ৩০ অক্টোবর ২০২৩ সালে নেত্র নিউজে প্রকাশিত হওয়া আমার লিখিত নিবন্ধের অনুবাদ। ২০২৩ সালের ৩০ মে, দুর্নীতি দমন কমিশন (দুদক) একটি প্রাথমিক তথ্য বিবরণী (এফআইআর) দাখিল করে যেখানে গ্রামীণ টেলিকমের চেয়ারম্যান মুহাম্মদ ইউনুসকে বিভিন্ন অভিযোগে অভিযুক্ত করা হয়। এফআইআরে  বলা হয়  ..read more

Bangladesh’s governing party officials are threatening voters with the loss of state benefits if they don’t show up at the polling centres in the country’s uncontested election.   On 7th January, 2024, an “election” of sorts will take place in Bangladesh. Perhaps it is best not described as an “election” but as a theatrical play or even charade which seeks to portray the people of Bangladesh as being able to make a real choice and that is one of choosing the Awami League as the legitimate party of government. With no opposition in attendance, it remains unclear whether those particip ..read more

[Original English version can be read here ..read more

  Bdnews24 published an oped which was titled “An open letter to David Bergman.” It contains a series of factual inaccuracies as well as misrepresentations. One would have thought that bdnews would agree to publish a response. But no. Bdnews editor-in-chief, Toufique Khalidi and its English language editor, Arun Devnath have failed to respond to repeated attempts to contact them.  Here is the article I would have liked the online news site to have published.   -------------   Rayhan Rashid, has a bit of a history. In 2012, then a key person within the International Crim ..read more

On February 1st, Al Jazeera broadcast the documentary, “All the Prime Minister’s Men” and since then the investigative film has been watched on social media millions of times and widely discussed in Bangladesh. The government and its supporters have responded very critically – but instead of responding through a detailed formal rebuttal of the substance of the allegations, they have launched a smear campaign against the broadcaster, and those interviewed in it - or others whom they falsely claim were involved in making the film. It is this smear campaign – not the substance of the film itse ..read more

Rayhan Rashid wrote a long critique of Al Jazeera's film, comments which were directed specifically at me, and so I thought I should find the time to respond to the main claims. He starts his long article by stating: “AJ’s investigation succeeded in establishing the following points to its credit: - That the current Army Chief of Bangladesh had occasionally been in contact with his two fugitive brothers. - That one of his two fugitive brothers is now using a false identity. - That the Army Chief failed to report his fugitive brothers to the authorities when they visited Bangladesh from tim ..read more

Awami League UK leaders outside Tulip Siddiq's election campaign office on the first day  of the UK national election campaign. Dozens of UK AL leaders and activists without any connection to the constituency came to the office daily - whilst local labour members were absent In the 2019 national UK election, the UK wing of Bangladesh's ruling party, the Awami League, organised a systemic campaign, somewhat covert in nature, involving dozens of its leaders and activists, to support the re-election of Tulip Siddiq as member of parliament in Hampstead and Kilburn.  The UK Awami L ..read more

Bangladesh, an authoritarian regime, notorious for arbitrary detentions, false cases, extra judicial killings and disappearances would not seem the ideal source for a supposed expose in the Sunday Times claiming that a businessman who has lived in the UK for ten years was in fact a jihadist “terrorist”, and “arms dealer”. But this did little to deter Tom Harper, the Sunday Time’s Home Affairs Correspondent from making such an allegation against Shahid Uddin Khan, a former colonel in the Bangladesh army in a report published late last month. If the provenance of the allegations did not itse ..read more

The story about what has happened to Colonel (rtd) Shahid Khan over the last fourteen months published on this blog (and previously by Al Jazeera) says a lot about contemporary Bangladesh - the impunity, the links between politics and business, the corruption of law enforcement, intelligence and other state bodies, the unlimited power of people around the prime minister Sheikh Hasina, the lies and false allegations - and how the victims simply just keep on piling up. Below are five key points that emerge from this story 1. The number of secret detentions and disappearances are almost ..read more

Colonel (rtd) Shahid Khan with the President of Bangladesh at the Hilton Hotel in London, April 26, 2017 Colonel Shahid Khan is a retired Bangladesh army colonel, turned businessman, who since 2009 has lived in the UK with his wife and daughters.  Until recently, Khan ran a Bangladesh company, Prochhaya Limited, jointly owned by both his own family and that of another retired Bangladesh army officer, Major General Tarique Ahmed Siddique.  Siddique is no ordinary retired officer. He is the Security Adviser to the Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina, and is now one of t ..read more