Bangladesh is having a nationwide Internet shutdown as students armed with sticks and hurling stones clash with police in protests against the government that reports said have left at least 39 people dead.
Network data showed an Internet blackout that first began on Thursday, monitoring service NetBlocks said on X.
Student protesters angered by the Bangladeshi government’s job quota policy attempted to shut down transport networks and businesses after authorities closed all universities.
Photo: AFP
AFP reported that 39 people have been killed in the clashes so far.
The Bangladeshi government has not commented on reported death toll or the outages.
The protests pose a challenge to Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who extended her grip on power for a fourth straight term in elections this year. If the demonstrations continue, they could further slow the economy at a time when Bangladesh is seeking funds from creditors and the IMF to bolster dwindling foreign-exchange reserves.
The local police said the protesters have set fire to several government buildings including the state broadcaster, the national disaster management agency and a toll plaza. Hackers defaced the official Bangladesh police Web site with messages describing the protest as “a war for justice, for freedom, and for our future.”
The US, the biggest buyer of Bangladesh’s exports and a vocal critic of Hasina’s government, condemned the violence.
“We need to make sure that any kind of freedom of expression is happening safely and people are free from violence,” US Department of State spokesman Vedant Patel told reporters in Washington on Thursday. “That’s something we’re continuing to pay close attention to.”
The students’ frustrations have centered on a policy that sets aside 30 percent of government job openings for family members of veterans from the 1971 war of independence from Pakistan, which critics say has been abused.
The anger stems also from persistently high youth unemployment that stands at about 40 percent, according to the latest census.
Hasina has sought to reassure the students, telling them to have faith in the courts while a case against the quota system is being deliberated.
However, she has also vowed to come down hard on those responsible for the violence, saying in a televised address on Wednesday that a judicial committee would investigate the turmoil.
Protesters say the quota system has excluded new job seekers in favor of supporters of Hasina, whose party led the movement to separate from Pakistan.
They want the system to be replaced with a merit-based one.
Government jobs are highly sought after in Bangladesh and have taken on greater importance as the economy struggles to rebound after the COVID-19 pandemic and years of strong growth. The largely student-driven protests began last month, but turned violent earlier this week and the Bangladesh’s main opposition party has joined in on the demonstrations.
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