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Date: 2025-08-20 Page is: DBtxt003.php txt00028139

BANGLADESH PRIME MINISTER FLEES COUNTRY BBC News: Bangladesh PM resigns and flees country as protesters storm palace PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8ScwHAQ2og Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Peter Burgess
Bangladesh PM resigns and flees country as protesters storm palace \| BBC News BBC News 1,797,526 views ... 17.5M subscribers ... 27K likes BBC is a British public broadcast service. Wikipedia Aug 5, 2024 #BBCNews #Bangladesh #Dhaka Bangladesh's Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has resigned and fled the country as anti-government protesters storm her official residence in the capital of Dhaka. Student leaders have declared a campaign of civil disobedience to demand that the nation's long-serving leader step aside On Sunday, at least 90 people were killed and hundreds more injured in clashes between police and tens of thousands of anti-government protesters The UN has called for an end to the 'shocking violence' and urged restraint from Bangladeshi politicians and security forces. Subscribe here: http://bit.ly/1rbfUog For more news, analysis and features visit: www.bbc.com/news #Bangladesh #Dhaka #BBCNews Transcript 0:00 I just want to move away from events here in the UK to some breaking news that we're getting from Bangladesh we are hearing that the Bangladesh Prime Minister has resigned and left the country her D her Destination Unknown this comes as thousands of people have stormed the prime minister's residence what we're going to do is join my colleague azade masheri who is talking to Samira say attacks on the ground look ever since these protests broke out about a ago uh many foreign journalists have been trying to get into the country but no one has really been able to get any visas to allow us to give us some of that firsthand accounts which is why we're depending on a lot of freelance journalists that are in the country now one person that the BBC is working with right now has said that really he can see lots of people celebrating on the streets hugging exchanging Garland's a real sense of a jovial kind of atmosphere and that would lead people to 1:00 believe that in fact Sheik Hina has resigned from her position and there are many media reporting that he she has actually already left the country if that is in fact the case it is a dramatic turn of events for Bangladesh and for the Prime Minister remember Sheik Hina only got like uh had there were elections rather in Bangladesh just earlier this year in January in which she Hina won her fourth term but those election elections rather were mired in a lot of um confusion because or rather there were questions about the elections legitimacy because the main opposition party did not contest in those elections and there were crackdowns on other opposition members that were trying to campaign and so I think there's just a lot of question about democracy and rule in Bangladesh for a very long time well well to that point Samir I also uh want 2:01 to confirm a BBC correspondent uh has now told us one of our colleagues has told us that the Prime Minister she Hina has resigned now as a reminder for anyone who is joining us right now we've been covering the protests in Bangladesh the Prime Minister has now resigned and according to reports has fled the country that's as protesters have stormed uh her resident now uh as a reminder student leaders have declared a campaign of Civil Disobedience as they put it to demand uh that sh H step aside uh that seems to have been successful and it's been uh at times violent on Sunday at least 90 people were killed and hundreds more injured in clashes between police and tens of thousands of anti-government protesters uh and the death toll does include at least 13 police officers uh Samira could you just put this into context for us given uh the hold that Sheik Hina has had on the country in the past uh how how big a moment this would be for the country look Sheik's government not just this particular term but her last few terms have been mired in controversy lots of um International members of the internal Community critical of her increasingly authoritarian regime now remember these particular protests started about a month ago and originally it was student L and they were demanding an end to these quotas that exist for civil government jobs and that was in fact overturned by the country's Supreme uh Supreme Court but since then we've seen that more the protests have really swelled and it became much more of a 4:01 movement a movement to try and remove Sheik Hina from power it became a very much an anti-government movement now the ruling government of course has called the protesters terrorists and said that they're just operating on behalf of the opposition parties in the country but the fact that we're seeing that Sheik Hina has actually resigned has left her position and is now going to another country a safer country in all likelihood she's probably going to come here to India I mean this is a really dramatic move for Bangladesh uh and now of course it begs a question of what's going to happen in terms of government what is the leadership structure going to look like um and is this going to end up leaving some kind of power vacuum now it's going to be really interesting to see just what happens on the ground and Samira just for context for our audiences we're showing live pi from one 5:00 of the broadcasters that's showing some of the protests uh that have been taking place it's from channel 24 uh and we're seeing uh people celebrating we're seeing people march a few moments ago before we were watching people storm uh the residence of shikina as we mentioned earlier the palace that she is said to have fled Samira could could you remind us of the police response that had taken place how does something like this succeed and happen what happened to the military for example because there there were questions weren't there about whether the military would intervene against students right and there was no sense that the military was going to intervene which perhaps could lead to questions about the loyalties of the military and whether that has in fact shifted I mean look it's not just the student-led protests that are going to push that are going to bring a government down solely at least perhaps in this situation a but 6:00 it is probably going to be a Confluence of events you know there is going to be questions about how much support that Sheik H had within her own government and perhaps she was losing confidence there uh you know the police Crackdown on these student protests was really quite harsh very quite very severe we saw that you know some 300 people have died in over the last month or so and that is worse than you I mean that's the violence that they haven't seen since the country has fought its civil it's fought its war of independence back in 1971 so this is a very significant moment in bang uh Bangladesh's politics and in the country and Samir I don't know if you can see these pictures but we're still showing them uh from uh the broad the broadcaster the local broadcaster there and we're seeing people with chairs sofas it seems that these are coming out of that residence again Sheik Hina is said to have fled with her sister to a safer place we 7:01 still are not sure uh of the location but it looks like people are grabbing anything they can find and uh destroying uh the premises uh as they declare this sort sort of Victory um I do want to again pause and reflect on what a big moment this would be given Sheik H has essentially been in charge since 2009 uh in her late 7s and now it would seem she's been toppled by this student Le movement Samira could you put into context what sort of uh Victory this is for the students because they've questioned democracy whether democracy truly exists in Bangladesh how have elections taken place in the past well in as far as the elections have taken place you know I was on the ground for the most recent elections in Bangladesh and you know didn't have 8:00 opposition parties that were contesting in the elections you saw on the ground only you know uh flyers and posters and billboards for those that are contesting as part of the government um so there really wasn't much of an election atmosphere and in fact we were able to speak with people that did work for the opposition parties and they would operate in secret there was a lot of people that were scared for their own safety we spoke with one uh Party official opposition party official who said that he doesn't even spend his nights at home because that's usually when government officials come knocking so there was this real sense of pervasive sense of fear um for anyone that didn't tow the government line and if you're seeing the kind of reaction that we're seeing with people storming into the prime minister's home and looting the prime minister's Palace you can imagine this is a group of people that have felt that they were very much um put down and we're under 9:00 authoritarian Rule and it's this sort of moment for them to break free and and doing this is it can sometimes be a cathartic sort of it is a cathartic sort of reaction to uh the rule that they have endured since as you rightly pointed out 2009 and Samira I I also just want to pause here on on how events have moved so quickly in some ways especially in the last few hours that you and I have been speaking because this morning we were talking about the March starting uh we were expecting an army Chief uh to give an address at about uh 8:00 GMT and we were talking about curfews and internet blackouts it just seems like like none of that was able to prevent uh someone who seen as a somewhat authoritarian leader staying in post so what was that sort of security 10:01 infrastructure that has collapsed have we have we seen a sort of weakness like this before well I think we started getting some early signs of a change or a shift when we heard that the speech was being delayed or the address of the nation by the Army Chief was being delayed because there were still some internal negotiations that were happening there are also some unconfirmed reports that you know sheiko wanted to deliver um an address a taped address to the nation but apparently that was not possible there were there was a lot more of a push to try and get her out of the country because if you saw on the streets that thousands and thousands of students were mobilizing to um make a March towards Daka towards the city center and presumably to the Palace so there was certainly a security issue for the Prime Minister and her family um but then we saw that you know although there were lots of police barricades in the 11:01 around the city of Taco we saw that the police were actually allowing the students to come in so I mean those were early indications that you saw actually there was a Monumental shift that was happening within the government now uh we mentioned the general there that we're waiting to hear from if he does speak you know we've been waiting more than 90 minutes now uh but there are reports from news agencies that uh that he that wer Zaman was holding meetings with stakeholders so there is the possibility that an address might be made uh in terms of this unrest I know Samira you went into this a little bit earlier but what happens in a country when the Prime Minister has fled we're seeing looting we're seeing unrest who is likely to step in in this sort of scenario well I think that's the big question sorry I was trying to get some more information from colleagues that are on the ground in Taka and I mean 12:00 that's really going to be the big question you know the last thing on Earth you want to see is some kind of power vacuum in any country but particularly Bangladesh because we have seen such clashes between anti-government protesters and the police I think what's important here now is to try and get a sense of the allegiance of the military and there are questions about whether this the country will now emerge into some kind of military rule until a new government can be formed these are all questions that I would think that you know that people on the ground are really still trying to work out which is presumably why we haven't heard um from the Army Chief just as yet

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