This week, clashes between students and armed police in Dhaka have resulted in the deaths of at least 16 individuals as anti-quota protests spread nationwide.
Thousands of students, armed with sticks and rocks, confronted police forces on Thursday, prompting authorities to cut some mobile internet services in an effort to control the situation.
The protests, the largest since Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s fourth re-election, are driven by widespread youth unemployment, affecting nearly 20% of Bangladesh’s 170 million citizens who are either jobless or out of education.
Demonstrators are calling for an end to the policy that reserves 30% of government jobs for the families of those who fought in the 1971 war of independence from Pakistan.
On Thursday in Dhaka, the death toll reached a single-day high with ten fatalities, including a bus driver who suffered a bullet wound to the chest, a rickshaw-puller, and three students.
Officials informed Reuters of the casualties, while witnesses reported hundreds more injured as police used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse crowds, who responded by setting vehicles, police posts, and other establishments ablaze.
Law Minister Anisul Huq stated the government’s readiness to hold discussions with the protesters.
However, the protesters declined, arguing, “We cannot trample over dead bodies to hold discussions.
Discussions could have taken place earlier,” as protest co-ordinator Nahid Islam told Reuters.
Prime Minister Hasina, the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman who led Bangladesh to independence, has so far refused to meet the protesters’ demands.
Earlier confrontations saw police using tear gas to disperse demonstrators near a Dhaka university, while mobile internet services were restricted to curb the protests.
Similar clashes occurred in Chittagong, where police fired tear gas at students blocking a highway.
Both the U.S. and Indian embassies in Dhaka issued advisories, recommending their citizens avoid demonstrations and large gatherings.
Authorities have also shut down all public and private universities indefinitely, deploying riot police and the Border Guard paramilitary force to maintain order on campuses.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the government’s appeal against a High Court verdict that ordered the reinstatement of the quota on August 7.
Prime Minister Hasina has urged students to remain patient until the court’s decision.
International organizations, including Amnesty International, the United Nations, and the United States, have called on Bangladesh to ensure the safety of peaceful protesters amidst the violence.
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