Reuters AlertNet Full site
Homepage | Newsdesk | NGO Latest | Crisis briefings | Country profiles | MediaWatch | Jobs | Alerting | Login

NEWSDESK

FACTBOX-Five facts on detained Bangladesh politician Hasina
16 Jul 2007 07:31:18 GMT
Source: Reuters
July 16 (Reuters) - Bangladeshi police took former prime minister Sheikh Hasina from her Dhaka home on Monday to a court that sent her to jail for detention over charges of extortion, court officials said.

Here are five facts on Hasina's life and career.

* Born on September 28, 1947, in the remote Tungipara village in southwestern Bangladesh, then East Pakistan, Hasina was the elder daughter of Sheikh Mujib Rahman, widely revered as the father of modern Bangladesh. He was the country's first president and later prime minister.

* A devout Muslim who has been on the haj pilgrimage several times, Hasina became politically active as a student, serving as a go-between for her father and his student followers in pro-independence agitations against the rule of former West Pakistan. Hasina has authored several books on Bangaldeshi politics.

* Hasina was briefly put under house arrest at Mujib's Dhanmandi residence by the Pakistani army during the nine-month guerilla war that ended with Bangladesh's independence in December 1971, along with family members and her husband, the nuclear physicist Wazed Ali Miah.

* Having graduated from Dhaka University in 1973, Hasina and her only sister were overseas in West Germany when her father, mother and three brothers were assassinated by disgruntled army officers in an August 1975 coup. Elected leader of her father's party, the Awami League, while in India during almost six years in exile, she was allowed to return to Bangladesh in 1981.

* Detained several times while in opposition in the nineties, Hasina took power as prime minister from 1996 to 2001 before being displaced by Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). She says extortion and corruption charges filed against her are designed to prevent her contesting an upcoming national election around late 2008. Her political woes deepened when murder charges were filed against her and 50 others in April 2007 over the deaths of 10 activists during street protests on Oct. 28 last year.

Source: Reuters


AlertNet news is provided by

Email this article       Send comments

Countries

Small country map
© 2004 Europa Technologies Ltd.
Reset map

•  Bangladesh profile
· View map

•  India profile
· View map

•  Pakistan profile
· View map

MORE >>

NGO latest

•  Update on Church World Service response to Pakistan flooding
CWS

•  Mercy Corps Transitions to Recovery in Pakistan Flood Zone
Mercy Corps

•  World Vision India coordinates cross State flood relief programs
WV - International

•  MUSLIM AID RESPONDS TO CYCLONE VICTIMS IN PAKISTAN
Muslim Aid - UK

•  Flood disaster in Pakistan: Malteser International distributes 1000 survival kits to victims of Cyclone Yemyin
Malteser International - Germany

MORE >>

Latest news

•  FACTBOX-Five facts on detained Bangladesh politician Hasina

•  ASIA: IRIN-ASIA Weekly round-up 132 for 9 - 15 July 2007

•  Cluster bombs deadly 10 years after Tajik war

•  Bangladesh police detain former PM Hasina

•  Australia halts Indian doctor's bail release

MORE >>

Disclaimers |  Copyright |  Privacy |  Contact Us |  Feedback |  About Us |  RSS XML

Last updated:Mon Jul 16 07:32:58 2007