December 10th, 2013
11:48 AM ET
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Bangladesh is about to hang an Islamist leader

Shortly after midnight in Bangladesh (1 p.m. ET), authorities plan to hang a top Islamist figure.

Abdul Quader Mollah was sentenced in September for alleged "crimes against humanity" dating back to 1971, during the country's war for independence.

The ruling against him set off rioting in the streets and sparked a strike across the country.

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Filed under: Bangladesh • World
August 1st, 2013
05:24 AM ET
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Bangladesh court: Islamist party illegal

Bangladesh's high court has declared the country's largest Islamist party, the Jamaat-e-Islami, illegal.

Jamaat is one of two main opposition parties and a constant thorn in the side of the ruling Awami League.

With the declaration, Jamaat will not be able to take part in the country's upcoming general election - certainly welcome news to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

But such a ruling can also reignite a fresh round of political unrest in the South Asian nation.

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Filed under: Bangladesh • Islam • World
May 10th, 2013
07:46 AM ET
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Survivor found 17 days after Bangladesh collapse

Crews working through the rubble at the Bangladesh building collapse site found a woman trapped in the wreckage and plucked her to safety Friday.

"I'm alive. Please rescue me," she said.

After she was pulled out of the debris, she was rushed to a hospital, an army official said.

The discovery comes more than two weeks after a building in a Bangladesh complex with factories full of garment workers caved in: South Asia's deadliest industrial disaster.

For the 17th day, rescue and recovery workers search through the nine-story building's tangled wreckage in Savar, a suburb of the capital, Dhaka.

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50 more found alive under collapsed building
April 26th, 2013
01:11 PM ET
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50 more found alive under collapsed building

[Updated at 1:11 p.m. ET] Rescuers tunneling Friday into the rubble of the eight-story building that collapsed Wednesday discovered another 50 people trapped on what remained of its third floor, an official said.

Bangladesh Fire Service Deputy Director Maj. Mizamur Rahman said rescuers were hoping to free them within a few hours.

Also Friday, two women who gave birth under the debris were rescued - along with their infants - a fire service official said, according to BSS.

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Filed under: Architecture • Bangladesh • Labor
Bangladeshi president dies at 84
President Zillur Rahman at the swearing-in ceremony at the Presidential Palace in Dhaka, February 12, 2009.
March 20th, 2013
11:33 AM ET
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Bangladeshi president dies at 84

Bangladeshi President Mohammad Zillur Rahman died Wednesday at a Singapore hospital, where he was being treated for a lung infection, an official with his office said. He was 84.

Rahman was admitted to Mount Elisabeth Hospital on March 10. He died there Wednesday afternoon, according to the official, Mohammad Shafiul Alam.

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March 4th, 2013
02:38 AM ET
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Bangladesh enters 2nd day of strike

Bangladesh on Monday entered the second day of a strike amid clashes between protesters and security forces that have killed dozens of people after an Islamist party leader was sentenced to death last week for war crimes.

The violence, which has shaken the South Asian country in recent days, left 21 people dead Sunday, authorities said, after supporters of the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami attacked police stations and government offices.

The unrest flared after a war crimes tribunal on Thursday handed down a death sentence to Delwar Hossain Sayedee, a top Jamaat leader, for war crimes committed during the country's nine-month war of independence in 1971.

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11 dead after fire rips through Bangladeshi slum
People gather around the wreckage of fire damaged rickshaws in a slum in Dhaka that left at least 11 dead.
November 18th, 2012
09:35 PM ET
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11 dead after fire rips through Bangladeshi slum

A fire swept through a shantytown in Bangladesh's capital on Sunday, killing at least 11 people, police and officials said. All the dead were children and women.

Authorities said the blaze burned some 700 closely packed thatched houses to the ground in the Hazaribagh area of Dhaka, rendering several thousand poor people homeless.

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At least 27 killed in sinking of Bangladeshi ferry
April 21st, 2011
05:56 PM ET
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At least 27 killed in sinking of Bangladeshi ferry

At least 27 people died Thursday when a ferry carrying about 100 people sank in a Bangladeshi river after striking a sunken cargo boat, police and officials said.

The incident occurred in Bangladesh's southeast Brahmanbaria district, in the Meghna River.

Divers have recovered 27 bodies, including 15 women, but "dozens of people are still missing" in the river, the district's administrative chief, Mohammed Abdul Mannan, told CNN.

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June 3rd, 2010
10:14 AM ET
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Officials: 25 killed in Bangladesh building collapse

Rescue workers pulled 25 bodies from the rubble of a four-story building in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Twenty-five people were killed in the collapse of a four-story building in Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, authorities said Thursday.

Fire officials said they had completed their rescue operation after pulling the 25 bodies from the rubble, two days after the building fell and destroyed nearby shanties. Most of the dead were in the shanties, Bangladesh’s online newspaper bdnews24.com reported.

According to a report from the Malaysian national news agency Bernama, the building was not constructed according to code, with additional construction above its original three-story height completed just a week ago.

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Filed under: Bangladesh • World