BRITAIN -BANGLADESH- BRINKS: DARKNESS GLOBAL ESSAY

 

DHAKA : Bangladesh on Friday announced the imposition of a curfew and the deployment of military forces after police failed to quell days of deadly unrest that has spread throughout the country.

The week's clashes between student demonstrators and police have killed over 105 people, according to AFP count of victims reported by hospitals, and pose a momentous challenge to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's autocratic government after 15 years in office.

Student protesters stormed a jail in central Bangladesh district of Narsingdi and freed all its inmates before setting the facility on fire, a police official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Pole fire was the cause of more than half of the deaths reported so far this week, based on the description given to AFP by hospital staff.

UN Human Rights chief Volker Turk said the attacks on student protesters were '' shocking and unacceptable''.

'' There must be impartial, prompt and exhaustive investigations into these attacks, and those responsible held to account.,'' he said in a statement.

The capital's police force earlier said protesters had on Thursday torched, vandalised and carried out '' destructive activities '' on numerous police and government offices.

Among them was the Dhaka headquarters of state broadcaster Bangladesh Television, which remains offline after hundreds of incensed students stormed the premises and set fire to a building.

JAIL TERM for UK climate activists stoke protest tights fears :

LONDON : Campaigners have voiced fears for the right to peaceful protest in the UK after five climate activists received hefty prison sentences for planning disruption.

Four Just Stop Oil [ JSO ] members were jailed for four years each last Thursday, while the group's co-founder Roger Hallam received five years.

They were accused of plotting to block the M25 motorway around London.

Hallam's five years is believed to be the longest sentence for non-violent protest in the UK, and comes with mounting concern about a wider crackdown on protest rights.

The UN Special Rapporteur for Environmental Defenders, Michael Forst, called it '' a dark day for peaceful environmental protest and indeed anyone concerned with the exercise of their fundamental freedom, '' in the UK.

'' This sentence should shock the conscience of any member of the public,'' he added in a statement.

'' It should also put all of us on high alert on the state of civic rights and freedoms in the United Kingdom.''

Sociologist Graeme Hayes, who specialises in environmental politics, social movements and direct action, said the sentences were '' clearly excessive and disproportionate''.

But he said they were the ''logical outcome of the authoritarian turn in Britain over the last five years.

The JSO protesters were convicted for conspiring to cause public nuisance.

Legislation introduced in 2022 made '' public nuisance '' punishable by up to 10 years in prison and gave the government wider powers to define what is considered '' disruption ''.

A Public Order Act passed just days before the coronation of King Charles III in May last year created new protest offences and increased police powers to search protesters who they believe will cause '' serious disruption ''. [AFP]