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Leading Bangladesh rights activist arrested

The police on Friday arrested Bangladesh's leading human rights activist and writer Shahriar Kabir, who had accused the country's Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led ruling alliance for "unleashing atrocities" against the minority Hindus, and sent him to the Dhaka central jail.

Kabir was detained at the Zia International Airport in Dhaka on his arrival on Thursday from Calcutta. He was produced before a local court on Friday and sent to jail, his friends and family said.

They said Kabir had been charged with anti-state activities.

In the forefront of the struggle against fundamentalism, Kabir, who is the convenor of the Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee (Committee for the Annihilation of Killers and Collaborator of 1971), had his passport seized soon after he landed in a Bangladesh Biman flight from Calcutta.

He had gone to Calcutta a fortnight ago and during which he is learnt to have talked to the Hindus who had crossed over to India.

The sources said the police had seized some audio and videocassettes from Kabir, which he was planning to use for a proposed national convention on atrocities on minorities in January.

Several prominent intellectuals and politicians have condemned the detention of Kabir and described it as "violation" of the rule of law and "violation" of human rights.

PTI

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