US team asks question about polls, detention of BNP leaders, attack on Hero Alom

The commissioner of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police  (DMP) and the head of the Detective Branch (DB) met with a combined team from the US-based National Democratic Institute (NDI) and International Republican Institute (IRI) on Wednesday at lawenforcment high-up‍‍`s respective offices.

The team asked about "actions on opposition leaders" by the lawenforcers and the security arrangements for the national elections scheduled for January 7.

At approximately 1:00 pm, the DMP chief and the joint technical assessment team met.

DMP Commissioner Habibur Rahman told the media that the joint team members asked questions about the election‍‍`s procedures, poll site security, security measures put in place for the candidates, and whether any of the candidates had filed complaints about the electoral process and, if so, how those complaints had been handled.

They also asked about safety precautions for females and the probability of violence.

"They kept asking us these kinds of questions, and we answered each one individually. We assured them that there is no room for doubting the extreme professionalism with which the police are operating. I believe they were satisfied with our responses," the DMP boss stated.

The mission coordinator for NDI-IRI, Natasha Rothchild, was accompanied by information environment analyst Ivaylo Pentchev, gender and inclusion analyst Mariam Tabatadze, security and state response analyst Crispin Kaheru, and security and physical violence analyst Nenad Marinkovic in the combined delegation.

Additionally, Mir Nurani Rupoma, senior assistant secretary of the foreign ministry,and Kazi Shahidul Islam Bangladesh representative were present among others.

Speaking to reporters, DB Chief Harun Or Rashid revealed that a another joint working group from US had inquired regarding the arrests of prominent BNP leaders and their treatment while detained.

"We told them that every BNP leader we had arrested were FIR-listed accused. In addition, a few prominent BNP officials paid a visit to the DB office. None of them mentioned that they were tortured or that we misbehaved with them," Harun said. 

They also inquired about sabotage during the election‍‍`s centering and BNP leader Ruhul Kabir Rizvi.

"We informed the team that BNP leader Rizvi is accused in multiple crimes when they inquired about him. Still, he‍‍`s handing out anti-state and anti-government pamphlets," he said.

They wanted to know about the attack on Hero Alom, aka Ashraful Hossain Alom.

"We told them that it‍‍`s an incident of the previous election and it happened on the road outside the polling center," Harun added in reference to Hero Alom and went on saying, "Everyone connected to this incident was arrested."