Khaleda Zia freed after two weeks

Security forces were deployed around opposition leader Begum Khaleda Zia's residence from December 25.

DHAKA:

Authorities in Bangladesh on Saturday allowed opposition leader Begum Khaleda Zia to leave her home to attend a meeting, in what her staff said was the first relaxation of a ‘virtual house arrest’ that has lasted more than two weeks.

Supporters say Khaleda had been prevented from leaving her residence before and after a violence-plagued parliamentary election won by the ruling Awami League. Security forces were deployed around her residence from December 25.

A spokesman for Khaleda’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party told reporters that she left her home for a meeting with Chinese Ambassador Lee Jung at her office in the city on Saturday. Osman Farruk, a senior leader of BNP told Reuters that until the government freed other party officials and stopped arrests and harassment “we cannot say it is a positive step.”

The Awami League led government, however, has denied holding the BNP leader under ‘house arrest’.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 12^th, 2014.