Bangladesh faces more protests<\/p>\n
DHAKA (Reuter): Fundamentalists vowed more protests yesterday
\nover an alleged insult to Islam by writer Taslima Nasrin after
\nfighting across Bangladesh on Thursday left one man dead and
\nnearly 200 people injured.<\/p>\n
The Bangladesh government called for calm and said only its
\nintervention had prevented worse violence in the clashes which
\nerupted during a general strike called by both fundamentalists
\nand their rivals.<\/p>\n
"The government expects that all people would show restraint
\nand shun the path of violence in the greater interest of
\ndemocracy and discipline," Home Minister Abdul Matin Chowdhury
\ntold parliament late on Thursday.<\/p>\n
One man was shot dead when Islamic militants tried to snatch
\nrifles from police at Kishoreganj, northeast of the capital,
\nDhaka.<\/p>\n
The strike, which shut down Dhaka and the ports of Chittagong
\nand Mongla, was called by both the ultra-rightist Islamic Morcha,
\nwho are demanding Nasrin's execution, and their rivals, who have
\nvowed to stop a resurgence of Islamic fundamentalism.<\/p>\n
Nasrin, a physician-turned-writer, provoked Moslem fury in
\nBangladesh for remarks attributed to her in India's Statesman
\nnewspaper. She said Islam's holy book, the Koran, should be
\n"revised thoroughly".<\/p>\n
About 8,000 fundamentalists on Thursday set fire to a foreign-
\nfunded development center and a rural hospital in northeast
\nBangladesh, local officials said.<\/p>\n
The militants, armed with sticks and rocks, said they resented
\nthe foreign-aided non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as much
\nas they hated Nasrin.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/bangladesh-faces-more-protests-1447893297",
"image": ""
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