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Bangladesh Violence Ahead Of Opposition Strike
DHAKA, April 1 (News Agencies) - At least one person was killed and more than 50 others injured Sunday in sporadic violence on the first day of a three-day opposition-called general strike in Bangladesh, police and reports said.
In southeastern Feni town, a driver was killed when a crude bomb was hurled on to his truck during the strike, the private Ekushey Television (ETV) reported.
The capital Dhaka was also rocked by a number of crude bomb blasts while at least six people were injured in strike-related violence, the official BSS news agency reported. One of them, a driver, was rushed to hospital in critical condition after a petrol bomb in the upmarket Baridhara district hit his three-wheeler, the agency added.
Nearly 200 people were injured and some 50 others arrested Sunday as well.
The authorities drafted in 5,000 police and paramilitary troops to tighten security in Dhaka where vehicles stayed off the streets and schools, shopping centers and markets remained shut, witnesses and police said.
Sunday is normally a working day in Muslim Bangladesh.
A spate of strike-related violence in Dhaka Saturday left some 40 people injured and up to 50 buses and vehicles damaged, Bangladeshi media reported, adding police broke up clashing opposition and government supporters in some districts.
The strike was called by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led alliance demanding the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed and her entire Awami League government as well as early polls.
In several districts, police used batons and teargas to disperse rampaging strikers.
The stoppage, due to end Tuesday evening, also paralyzed the southeastern port city of Chittagong where the previous day's violence left 10 people injured and 24 others detained, police said.
BNP chief Khaleda Zia, who heads a four-party opposition alliance, last month gave the government until March 30th to step down or face the two-day nationwide shutdown. An opposition-backed student group extended the strike until April 3rd.
Sheikh Hasina, who earlier said she would step down after April 17th and seek re-elections before June 12th, later withdrew her offer. On Friday she blasted Zia again for her alleged intransigence and ruled out the prospect of polls before mid-July when the government's five-year term ends.
According to Bangladesh's constitution, polls for 300 parliamentary seats have to be staged by a caretaker government within three months of the dissolution of parliament.
The recent standoff between the opposition and the government has added fresh political uncertainties about new elections, raising fears of more violence and confrontation, analysts have said.
The country's business community expressed anguish over the lingering standoff and the strikes, which they said were hitting the common people hard, and the crippling nation's fragile economy.
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