Dhaka: Bangladeshi police have released a man from a hospital and arrested a leader of student protests that led to nationwide unrest last week, which erupted as security forces clashed with protesters.
Students have been protesting since early July against a rule that would have guaranteed a significant number of government posts to descendants of those who fought in the country's 1971 war of independence.
Since protests turned violent last week, local media have reported at least 209 people have been killed and thousands injured.
Most of the casualties were reported in Dhaka, where violent clashes broke out between protesters, government supporters, police and paramilitary forces, and the country was blacked out for six days.
Among the injured were student leaders Nahid Islam and Asif Mahmood, coordinators of the main protest group Students Against Discrimination. They were admitted to Dhaka's Gonoshasthya Hospital and were arrested by the Dhaka Police's Crime Branch on Friday evening. Another student leader, Abu Baker Majumder, who had been visiting Islam and Mahmood, was also detained.
Criminal Division Chief Harun Orrasheed told reporters in Dhaka on Saturday that the three were detained “for security reasons” because their families were concerned about their safety.
“We took them in to ensure their safety,” he said.
Hospital staff told Arab News that the student leaders were arrested by about a dozen plainclothes police officers, despite objections from medical staff.
“At first we tried to make them understand that without proper protocols, patients who were admitted cannot be discharged from the hospital. Later, they consulted with the authorities and the students were transferred from the hospital. There was no way to keep them any longer,” the hospital staff said on condition of anonymity.
“The students’ health was not very good… Asif was suffering from low blood pressure, while Nahid had blood clots and bruises in several parts of his body. Both required additional treatment.”
The arrests come as police ramp up operations in Dhaka, where a curfew imposed last week remains in place.
Dhaka police joint commissioner Liton Kumar Saha said 2,284 people were arrested in clashes related to the protests in Dhaka and several administrative offices were burnt down.
“We are analyzing footage from various locations and identifying the miscreants. If we confirm that someone is involved in the anarchy, we conduct operations to arrest them. It is being done transparently and we are identifying those involved in the sabotage,” he told Arab News.
“245 people have been arrested in Dhaka in the last 24 hours. Our efforts will continue until the situation normalizes.”
International human rights groups have repeatedly raised concerns about Bangladesh's handling of the protests, with Amnesty International saying eyewitness testimony and video and photographic evidence “confirm that police used unlawful force against student protesters”.
The protests came after the High Court upheld a controversial quota system, which would have set aside 56 percent of public service jobs for certain groups, including women, the underprivileged and children and grandchildren of freedom fighters, while the government would have set aside 30 percent of all jobs for them.
The Supreme Court last week ordered the quota system to be scaled back, requiring 93 percent of government jobs to be allocated based on merit.
