The New Nation - Internet Edition

Syndicate controls sugar market: Tk 3,780 price rise per ton in 3 weeks

Syful Islam

A four-member syndicate is looting huge sums of money from the market through increasing price of sugar and other key essential commodities including edible oil, pulse and flour, alleged leaders of the sugar dealers association.

The syndicate has increased price of sugar by Tk 3,780 per ton within the last 25 days making the market totally unstable. Per kilogram of sugar is now selling at Tk 40 in the retail market, which was selling at Tk 32 one-month back.

Informed sources said Bangladeshi sugar market is now being controlled by four private refiners- City Group, Meghna Group, Igloo Group and Deshbandhu Sugar Mills Ltd. State-owned sugar mills could produce only 1.90 lakh tones of sugar out of total demand of 14 lakh tones. The rest is being met by the four private organisations.

Sources said the four private sugar company Wednesday stopped issuing Delivery Order (DO) in their Moulavibazar office to make the sugar market more unstable and increase price of the essential. On Tuesday last they sold per ton of sugar at Tk 36,450. On the other hand, the state owned Bangladesh Sugar and Food Industries Corporation (BSFIC) is selling sugar at Tk 34,000.

At present the BSFIC has stock of only 64,443 tones of sugar, which can meet only three months demand. Market players said once the stock of BSFIC is finished the private companies will raise the price of sugar to more than Tk 70 per kg and make people hostage.

President of Bangladesh Sugar Dealers Association Mustafizur Rahman Babul and General Secretary Alhajj Dewan Jinnah yesterday told The New Nation that private refiners and importers have already held consumers hostage and continuously increasing the price of sugar.

They said the government should bring control on the market through importing and selling sugar by the BSFIC and the Trading Corporation of Bangladesh.

Senior Vice President of the association Delwar Hossain said the government will have to face more complication with sugar price as it is facing due to price hike of edible oil and flour, if it fails to control the market.

BSFIC Chairman Kabir M Ashraf Alam yesterday told this correspondent that his organisation was making huge loss through selling sugar by Tk 11 lower than the production cost as the essential was dumping from neighbouring India. The production cost of per kg sugar of state owned mills is Tk 36.

He said the BSFIC can only produce 10 per cent of the total demand while the private sector supplies nearly 80 per cent.

In India, Kabir said, one has to follow the directives of the Sugar Directorate if he wants to sell sugar. But in Bangladesh BSIFC has no control on private sector, which results in monopoly among them, he said.

Meanwhile, the BSFIC recently has asked the government to raise the import duty to Tk 12,000 per ton from the existing Tk 5,000.

Another Hillary comeback: Secures key primaries, Obama wins Vermont, McCain gets Republican nomination

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John
McCain

AP, Washinton

Hillary Rodham Clinton, fresh off a campaign saving comeback, hinted Wednesday at the possibility of sharing the Democratic presidential ticket with Barack Obama - with her at the top. Obama played down his losses, stressing that he still holds the lead in number of delegates.

On a night that failed to clarify the Democratic race, John McCain Tuesday clinched the Republican nomination. Clinton won primaries in Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island, halting Obama's winning streak. Obama won in Vermont.

Both Democrats insisted on Wednesday they had the best credentials to go head to head - or as Clinton put it "toe to toe" - against McCain.

Asked on CBS's "The Early Show" whether she and Obama should be on the same ticket, Clinton said: "That may be where this is headed, but of course we have to decide who is on the top of ticket. I think the people of Ohio very clearly said that it should be me."

Obama, who had hoped to knock Clinton out on Tuesday, said he would prevail against a tenacious candidate who "just keeps on ticking." Clinton acknowledged the race was close and said it would come down to her credentials on national security and the economy.

The two presidential contenders made the rounds of the morning network television news shows Wednesday, declaring only one thing certain - that the campaign would go on and that the next big showdown would occur April 22 in Pennsylvania.

McCain, whose grasp on the nomination once seemed a distant reach, was headed for the White House Wednesday to have lunch with President Bush and get his endorsement. Bitter rivals in the 2000 presidential primaries, the two have forged an uneasy relationship during Bush's administration and have clashed on issues such as campaign finance, tax cuts, global warming and defining torture.

But the president planned a five-star ceremony, with a formal welcome at the White House's North Portico, lunch in Bush's private dining room and a formal endorsement in the Rose Garden.

Clinton's victories Tuesday night denied Obama a ripe opportunity to drive her from the Democratic presidential race. But Obama came away with a large share of delegates, too, in counting that continued Wednesday, meaning he's has a lead that's tough to overcome.

"We still have an insurmountable lead," Obama said. "We're very confident about where we're going to be and that we can win the nomination and the general election."

Clinton and Obama spent most of the past two weeks in Ohio and Texas in a bruising campaign, with the former first lady questioning his sincerity in opposing the North American Free Trade Agreement and darkly hinting he's not ready to be commander in chief in a crisis. Obama also confronted questions about one of his longtime political benefactors, businessman Antoin "Tony" Rezko, who went on trial Monday in Chicago on several felony fraud charges.

Clinton said Wednesday that so-called "superdelegates" - nearly 800 party officials and top elected officials who also help decide the nomination - should exercise "independent judgment" in selecting the party's nominee.

"New questions are being raised, new challenges are being put to my opponent," she said. "Superdelegates are supposed to take all that information on board and they are supposed to be exercising the judgment that people would have exercised if this information and challenges had been available several months ago."

She said voters are being drawn to her argument that she would be the better commander in chief, the best steward of the economy and that she can better confront McCain in the general election.

Obama countered Wednesday that on a key national security issue - the war in Iraq - "she got it wrong" by supporting Bush's call for authority to use of force.

"I ultimately think the American people are going to want a clear break from the Bush-Cheney foreign policies of the past because they haven't made us more safe and more secure," he said. "If she thinks that longevity in Washington is the primary criteria for winning the White House, then John McCain is going to beat her."

Clinton won about 54 percent of the Ohio vote in nearly complete returns. She was winning just over half in the Texas primary.

She still faced a daunting task trying to overtake Obama in the remaining contests. It was questionable whether she would make up much ground once the final results were in and the complexities of allotting the 370 delegates at stake in the four states were ironed out.

In the four-state competition for delegates, Clinton picked up at least 115, to at least 88 for Obama. Nearly 170 more remained to be allocated for the night, 154 of them in the Texas primary and the caucuses that immediately followed.

Obama had a lead in Texas caucuses before counting closed for the night Tuesday, to be resumed Wednesday.

Obama had a total of 1,477 delegates, including separately chosen party and elected officials known as superdelegates, according to the Associated Press count. He picked up three superdelegate endorsements Tuesday.

Clinton had 1,391 delegates. It takes 2,025 to win the nomination.

Wyoming offers 12 delegates in caucuses Saturday; Mississippi has 33 at stake next week. The biggest remaining prize is Pennsylvania, with 158 delegates, April 22.

Polling place interviews with voters in both states suggested the criticism hit home, finding Clinton was winning the votes of late deciders in Ohio and Texas, as well as Vermont.

Opinion polls had shown Obama overcoming significant and long-standing Clinton leads in Texas and Ohio, but his gains slowing in the final stretch.

Hispanics, a group that has favored Clinton in earlier primaries, cast nearly one-third of the Election Day votes in Texas, up from about one-quarter of the ballots four years ago, according to interviews with voters as they left their polling places.

Blacks, who have voted heavily for Obama this year, accounted for roughly 20 percent of the votes cast, roughly the same as four years ago.

Both Democrats called McCain - a Senate colleague - to congratulate him on his triumph in the Republican race.

The 71-year-old Arizona senator surpassed the 1,191 delegates needed to win his party's nomination.

He sealed a nomination race against odds that seemed steep only a few months ago, and all but impossible last summer.

Facing a couple of well-financed marquee candidates in a crowded field, he opened his comeback in New Hampshire's leadoff primary, rolled over Rudy Giuliani in Florida and finished off Mitt Romney after Super Tuesday on Feb. 5.

Mike Huckabee hung in until Tuesday night, gamely keeping up the fight weeks after dropping from long shot to afterthought. He went out as he came in - never missing a chance for a wisecrack.

"It's time for us to hit the reset button," he said. "We started this effort with very little recognition and virtually no resources. We ended with slightly more recognition and very few resources."

On Tuesday night, McCain delivered a speech on the state of the union as he wants to make it: secure from Islamic extremism, victorious in Iraq, confident in trade, sound in its economy.

"Americans aren't interested in an election where they are just talked to and not listened to; an election that offers platitudes instead of principles and insults instead of ideas," he said.

"Their patience is at an end for politicians who value ambition over principle, and for partisanship that is less a contest of ideas than an uncivil brawl over the spoils of power."

Pak court drops graft cases against Zardari

Asif Ali Zardari

AFP, Islamabad

A Pakistani anti-corruption court Wednesday officially terminated five cases against the husband of assassinated opposition leader Benazir Bhutto and released his frozen assets, his lawyer said.

The ruling follows a government amnesty granted to Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari in October, which dropped cases against the pair stemming from her two terms as prime minister and paved the way for her return from exile.

Zardari, 51, took over as head of Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party after she was slain at a political rally in December. The party emerged as the largest single grouping after elections in February.

"Allah has differentiated truth from lies and justice has been done," Zardari's lawyer, Farooq Naik, told reporters outside the court in Rawalpindi, a garrison city near Islamabad.

The court had "terminated" five cases against Zardari and unfrozen his assets, Naik said. Two more cases were pending but would be thrown out at the next hearing, he said.

"Benazir Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari were the victims of Draconian laws, but today all cases have finished like the dark, old night," Naik added.

Zardari spent eight years in prison on various corruption charges dating from Bhutto's spells as premier from 1988-1990 and 1993- 1996. He was released on bail in late 2004.

Bhutto fled Pakistan in 1999 for self-imposed exile in London and Dubai because of the corruption cases but always maintained that they were politically motivated.

She returned home in October after President Pervez Musharraf agreed on the amnesty deal in what was seen as a prelude to a likely power-sharing deal between the two.

The PPP is now set to form a coalition government with former premier Nawaz Sharif-the man ousted by Musharraf in 1999 -- after they both trounced the president's allies in the parliamentary elections.

A night of high drama

Agency, Washington

It was a night of drama that offered all the epic themes of Campaign 2008 in crystallised form - victory and defeat, youth and experience, and even, when it came to the Texas voting system, chaos and confusion.

For once the Republicans should have had the better story to tell - John McCain wrapped up their nomination with a string of easy victories.

But it was the Democrats who once again grabbed the headlines with another Hillary Clinton comeback, throwing her party's race wide open once again.

Mrs Clinton won in Rhode Island and in the much larger state of Ohio (which has an uncanny knack of voting for candidates who go on to be president) - and above all, she won the popular vote in Texas.

It was a sweep of results that made a nonsense of predictions on the way in to the voting that she would be forced to withdraw from the race if she did not manage at least a couple of victories. She celebrated with one of her best speeches of the campaign so far.

It was one of the few evenings when she was more colourful and more passionate than her rival - dedicating her victory to "everyone who's ever been counted out, but refused to be knocked outtand everyone who works hard and refuses to give up".

Some of her rhetorical devices even felt as though they had been, let us say, inspired by Barack Obama.

He is fond of telling the story of a poor women who sent him a money-order for $3.01 to help him in his campaign.

Mrs Clinton now offers a mother of two little girls who sent her $10, and who wrote movingly of how she and her daughters cheer and chant along with the crowds whenever they see her on television.

It almost sounded like acknowledgement that Mrs Clinton knows she does best on days like this - when she is being written off by the media, and when Mr Obama's people are making a little too much of the argument that he is the front runner and that it is mathematically impossible for her to catch up with him in the delegate count.

It is curious that it is now Obama, the poetic candidate whose sweeping rhetoric can lift huge crowds, who is left to make that rather cold mathematical argument based on the way his party uses proportional representation to choose its candidates, while Mrs Clinton revels for the first time in months in the feeling that momentum is with her.

We can make a guess at the tone of the campaign to come now, too.

Mrs Clinton put Mr Obama under pressure in the last couple of weeks and it seemed to work.

Look out for a few more examples of going negative - we will soon see if Mr Obama fights back in kind or if he has a glass jaw.

It may well be that even in Ohio and Texas, Mrs Clinton shares the available delegates almost equally with her rival, but her supporters will argue that hardly matters.

For the Clinton Camp, 4 March was all about stopping Obama's seemingly unstoppable progress to the nomination and denting the sense of mystique and inevitability that he was starting to develop.

The Texas Democratic voting system, by the way, is maddeningly slow to yield up its final results - the state uses a system which is jokingly referred to as the "Texas two-step" in which voters are asked to take part first in a conventional election - the primary - and then, hours later, in a long, argumentative discussion system - a caucus.

When too many people turn up, the only result you get for hours, is total chaos.

In a sense, though, the final figures are not important.

Mrs Clinton's performance should be enough to persuade any "super delegates" who were thinking of backing Mr Obama to pause for a while and to see what happens next.

Hillary Clinton

16 states, 1,391 delegates: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas

Barack Obama

24 states, 1,477 delegates: Alabama, Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington state, Wisconsin

2,025 delegates needed for nomination.

Doctors examine Hasina, Jalil operated upon

Staff Reporter

Three personal physicians have examined the health condition of detained former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina at her prison-bunglow while her party's General Secretary Abdul Jalil has undergone kidney operation at the Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore yesterday.

The three medical experts, who observed the state of Sheikh Hasina's ailments in two phases yesterday, were-Dr Shaila Khatun, Prof Dr ABM Abdullah and Dr Baren Chakrabarti.

Obstetrician and gynaecologist Dr Shaila Khatun, also a personal friend of Sheikh Hasina, scrutinised her ailments from 10:55 am and 12:38 pm, while Prof Dr ABM Abdullah of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University (BSMMU) and Cardiologist Dr Baren Chakrabarti of LabAid Hospital from 4:15pm to 7: 45 pm, senior jail officials said.

Three doctors have advised the Awami League (AL) some more medical tests and some medicines, they added.

Some other doctors, Prof Dr Syed Modasser Ali, who led the 10-member medical board that examined her at Square Hospial on February 21, are expected to examine her today at the Special Prison (bunglow) on the premises of the sprawling Parliament building complex in the capital.

The doctors started examining Sheikh Hasina, a day after the Government announcement that it would allow the two detained Prime Ministers abroad for medical treatment if they so wished on Wednesday, when by her scientist husband Dr Wazed Mia, in a letter, requested Chief Adviser Dr Fakhruddin Ahmed to send Sheikh Hasina abroad freeing her on parole.

However, no news was available about the other detained Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia's consent about her medical treatment abroad till filing of this report last night. It may be mentioned here both the sons Tarique Rahman and Arafat Rahman Koko-of Begum Zia, also the Chairperson of the BNP, are detained like her on separate corruption charges.

As per the announcement the Government, both the former Prime Ministers, who are now facing a number of separate corruption charges would be allowed go abroad for treatment if medical boards recommend.

Meanwhile, senior leaders of her party learnt to have been carrying out an intense lobbying for Sheikh Hasina's complete freedom instead of sending her on parole like that of the party General Secretary Abdul Jalil, who was released under five conditionality for treatment in Singapore.

Demanding complete freedom for Sheikh Hasina, who is now under trial, AL Acting President Zillur Rahman pleaded to the Government, saying, "Please don't undermine our great leader (Hasina) by releasing her on parole.

AL Assistant Office Secretary Ashim Kumar Ukil told a press briefing that doctors at the Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore have operated kidney of ailing General Secretary Abdul Jalil.

"Medical experts will conduct his (Jalil) heart operation within a day or two," he said without elaborating the nature of Jailil,s kindney operation.

"Doctors said the operation was successful and his condition was stable," Ashim added.

However, there was no report about the ailing BNP Secretary Khandaker Delwar Hossain and his wife, both of were supposed to get admitted at the Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore for treatment a day before the AL General Secretary.

When contacted last night, BNP (anti-reform) Acting Office Secretary Rizvee Ahmed, who disclosed their departure to Singapore at a press conference on Monday, the day Abdul Jalil left Dhaka for the same place, would not tell anything about the ailing Khandaker Delwar couple.

Electoral laws monthend after talks with BNP

Staff Reporter

The Election Commission (EC) will finalise electoral laws by the end of this month after holding dialogue with BNP in time.

We hope we will be able to finalise the electoral laws by this month in accordance with the court direction on BNP's representation, Election Commissioner Brig Gen (Retd) Mohammad Sakhawat Hossain said this while talking to reporters at the EC Secretariat yesterday.

Election Commissioner Muhammad Sohul Hossain, who also explained the present stand of the Commission, said the Commission is now reviewing the feedback that it received from the political parties during the two round of dialogue.

"We will finalise them after the dialogue with the BNP," he echoed with his colleague.

He further said the Commission would sit with the BNP within a week after having of court verdict on the matter.

Sakhawat Hossain said the Commission would sit twice in dialogue with the BNP as it had with other parties to finalise the draft laws.

He reiterated that the electoral laws would not be finalised without holding talks with the BNP.

Asked whether the local government polls would be held before the national polls or both would be staged simultaneously he said the Commission is yet to make any decision in this regard.

A total of 15 political parties, including the Awami League (AL), Jamaat-e-Islami, Jatiya Party and Islami Oikya Jote (IOJ) took part in the two-round of dialogues with the EC ended on February 29.

However, the EC could not hold talks with the BNP due to legal complication as a writ petition is pending with the higher court as to which faction should be invited to the dialogue.

Energy subsidy: BPC to ask govt to review policy

Staff Reporter

The Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) has decided to ask the interim Government to review its energy subsidy policy under a mounting financial burden.

Chairman BPC Anwarul Karim said the state-owned entity had finalised a proposal urging the review. It will be forwarded to the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry within this week, he said.

"The government is giving equal subsidies to all consumers. It should be reviewed whether it is right to give subsidies this way," Karim said.

According to him, it was the Government's discretion to decide how and to whom they provided subsidies. "It should be done in a way which would give subsidies a target group of people," he added.

The prices of refined diesel have crossed the US$118 per barrel mark in Kuwait on Tuesday, Karim said.

"When you take into consideration the cost of transportation, VAT, customs tax, river tax and insurance costs, the BPC deficit is bound to increase," he said.

The Finance Division has allocated Tk 400 crore against the demand for Tk 5,855 crore to finance the deficit, he said.

On Feb 26, the BPC sent a letter to the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry to inform the need for foreign currency to open letters of credit for the importation of fuel to combat the financial crisis.

The BPC has also requested the Energy Ministry to take steps to ensure a US$500 million (Tk 3,429 crore) loan through nationalised commercial banks.

The BPC letter said in the 2007-08 fiscal year the expenditure for importing refined and unrefined fuel oil and other expenses had been estimated at approximately US$4,506 million.

Last month, a letter from the energy division to the finance division said that BPC statistics showed the financial loss incurred in the first six months of the current fiscal year amounted to over Tk 1,941 crore.

In the current fiscal year, BPC will require a total of three billion American Dollar to import all its required fuel.

The procurement of fuel, especially diesel, and its distribution to farmers has become uncertain due to complexities in securing loans and the enormous financial burden.

Earlier, the chief adviser's special assistant in charge of energy M Tamim asked the finance adviser to arrange a $900 million loan to ensure the supply of fuel oil during the January-June period of the current fiscal year.

Ershad, Badruddoza plan alliance

Staff Reporter

Jatiya Party Chairman Lt Gen (Retd) Hossain Muhammad Ershad and Bikalpa Dhara President Dr AQM Badruddoza Chowdhury yesterday indicated their parties might form an alliance to fight the coming election.

After a meeting at Mahi B Chowdhury's residence at Gulshan the two leaders told reporters that it was the start of a process whether they could walk together in politics.

"We have discussed about the recent political situation and tried to find out some grounds where we could be unified and walk together in politics in future," Jatiya Party chairman HM Ershad said.

This was a part of a series of talks of the Bikalpa Dhara Bangladesh with like-minded political parties.

Dr B Chwodhury said, "We are only at the initial stage of our process and time has not come yet to come to a conclusion."

"We want to explore some common grounds and we have talked about those in the meeting," said the BDB Chairman.

He said, "We had earlier discussed with other parties about the political situation in the country like Workers Party, JSD and have also talked with Awami League and leaders of the both factions of BNP"

Both the leaders said they do not want to return to the pre-1/11 situation and at the same time they want people's democracy after holding a meaningful and fair elections as per the EC's roadmap.

Dr B Chowdhury said, "We did not get everything what we demanded before the 1/11 but we are in a process to get the things."

The leaders said their parties would participate in the city elections.

The former presidents would hold further meeting at Gen (Retd) HM Ershad's residence after B Chowdhury comes from Singapore where he is supposed to go on March 9, said sources.

Acting Chairman of Jatiya Party Anisul Islam Mahmud, BDB Secretary General Maj (Retd) MA Mannan and Organising Secretary Mahi B Chowdhury, among others, were present at the meeting.

India waives ban 4.5 lakh tons rice to be imported

Staff Reporter

India has allowed export of 450,000 tons of non-basmati rice to Bangladesh, waiving a ban on the classified commodity export.

Indian Director General of foreign trade said in a statement on Tuesday.

The country currently has prohibited rice exports of any variety priced below US$500 per ton.

The official said, state-run companies, namely the State Trading Corporation, MMTC Ltd, PEC Ltd and National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd will export 100,000 tons each to its neighboring Bangladesh, where price of rice is one roller-coastar ride.

It was mentioned that the West Bengal Essential Commodities Supply Corporation Ltd will export 50,000 tons taking the total 5,00,000 tons that was committed by Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee during his last visit to Dhaka immediately after the Super Cyclone Sidr devastated its southwestern coast on November 15, 2007.

Bangladesh needs nearly two million tons of food grains including rice by the end of June-2008, following a devastating cyclone in November and two consecutive floods, which killed over 4,100 people and left millions homeless and no crops left over the fields.

However, the official notification did not give any reason for allowing the exports, sidelining the export ban.

Indian High Commissioner in Dhaka Pinak Ranjan Chakrabarti earlier said the 5,00,000 tons promised rice as Sidr relief will not come under current price list.

However, the Bangladesh Government had urged the international community to provide rice to feed its calamity-affected population.

Advisory Council meet in Barisal today

UNB, Barisal

Necessary preparations have been taken for holding the second meeting of the advisory council of caretaker government here outside Dhaka scheduled to be held at the local Circuit House today.

More than 1,500 additional forces with uniform and plain clothes from different law enforcing agencies, including special security forces and presidential guard regiment, have already been deployed in the key points of the city, routes, meeting places and residences of the advisory council members.

Check-posts at the different entry points, transports, roads and highways have been installed while residential hotels and public gathering places were kept in regular vigilance.

All types of gathering, function, indoor and outdoor meetings in the city and surrounding areas of the CA's travel route have been postponed for two days from Thursday.

Chief Advisor Dr Fakhruddin Ahmad will land at Barisal Airport today. After attending the meeting, he will go to Rajapur upazila in Jhalakati district.

He will leave here on Friday morning.

BNP leader shot dead in city

Staff Reporter

A BNP leader was gunned down in the capital's posh Dhanmondi area yesterday afternoon, 20 days after his release from jail on bail.

The killing of Mostafa Zaman Shibli, general secretary of the Ward No-48 unit of the immediate-past ruling party, took place in a latest spurt in criminal acts in and around the capital city.

Shibli, son of Nuruzzaman of Jigatola area, came out of his residence responding to a mobile-phone call at about 6:15pm, said Sufian, a relative of the victim.

"As he reached Dhanmondi Road no 7/A, some 100 yards off his residence, gunmen sprayed bullets targeting Shibli and fled the scene," Sufian added.

He was rushed to Dhaka Medical College Hospital where the on-duty doctor declared him dead.

Shibli was released on bail from Dhaka Central Jail 20 days back. He was arrested in connection with the Dhaka University student unrest in August last year, which also landed four DU teachers and some students in jail.

Motives behind the killing could not be ascertained immediately.

A day before, an Awami Swecchasebak League leader was shot dead in the city's Shajahanpur area in similar gun attack.

AL for unconditional release of Hasina

UNB, Dhaka

Acting Awami League president Zillur Rahman yesterday requested the caretaker government to unconditionally release detained party chief Sheikh Hasina and arrange her appropriate treatment abroad.

"The government should release Sheikh Hasina unconditionally as she is not such a personality who goes to ground, and it should take proper initiative to send her abroad for better ear treatment," he said.

The party's acting chief made the request a day after Hasina's husband, Dr Wazed Mia, formally applied to the Chief Adviser of the caretaker government for sending her to the United States on unconditional release for treatment.

Meanwhile, seriously sick AL general secretary Abdul Jalil has been released on parole from jail custody and taken to Singapore for his treatment.

Zillur made the plea while talking to reporters when party leaders of Comilla and Georgia, USA, unit met him at his Gulshan residence.

Responding to a query whether sending Hasina abroad is part of implementing the so-called 'minus-two' formula, the acting AL president said, "I hope that the government will not create such bad times."

The minus-two formula, floated at the outset of the political reforms launched by the interim regime following the past political crisis, envisages sending the two former premiers-Hasina and Khaleda Zia-into exile for changing what is dubbed dynastic leadership of their two former ruling parties.

Appreciating the government decision on Jalil's treatment abroad through release on parole, Zillur requested the government for giving such scope to other ailing political detainees too.ahead of parliamentary polls, he said holding local elections is not the obligation of this government. The main duty of this government is to hand over power to an elected government by holding elections.

"News regarding holing local-body elections has created uncertainty among the people over holding national polls," Zillur said and asked the government to announce the date of national elections immediately to remove anxiety from people's mind.