Author: Priya Saha

The construction industry needs to radically change the way it works to address gender, inclusivity and diversity issues to better reflect the society it serves, according to leading industry influencers at a hard-hitting Infrastructure Intelligence webinar on Friday 30 April 2021. Tackling systemic discrimination from an early age, highlighting engineering as a positive career choice to girls while still at school, engaging with and listening to diverse communities to influence future generations and clearing the way to a more inclusive leadership were all flagged up as vital ways for the industry to help drive positive change. Hosted by Infrastructure Intelligence…

ANKARA: Turkey’s Incirlik Air Base is once again at the center of debates over Ankara-Washington relations, following US President Joe Biden’s recognition on Saturday of the Ottoman Empire’s mass deportations and killings of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and 1917 as genocide.  Biden’s decision to recognize the Armenian Genocide has angered decision-makers in Ankara who assert that there are no historical or legal grounds to classify the mass killings in this way.  During times of tension between Ankara and Washington, Incirlik Air Base — commonly used by the US for operations in the Middle East, particularly attacks on Daesh…

PESHAWAR: The Auqaf, Hajj, Religious and Minorities Affair Department has failed completely to utilize its Rs370.20 million funds in the first 10 months of this fiscal year in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P). Official sources told The Express Tribune that out of the Rs370 million allocated funds around Rs350 million were released by the Finance Department but the Religious Affairs Department only managed to utilize Rs110.93 million funds. “It is interesting to note that this year Rs160.43 million were allocated for religious affairs in the K-P but the expenditures stand at Rs90.14 million despite the fact that the Finance Department has released Rs170.50…

File photo: Police arrest Hefazat-e-Islam Joint Secretary General Mamunul Haque at Jamia Rahmania Arabia Madrasa in Dhaka’s Mohammadpur area on Sunday, April 18, 2021 Mahmud Hossain Opu/Dhaka Tribune DB sources claim to have found links between Hefazat and BNP-Jamaat, foreign militant groups The pressure on Hefazat-e-Islam Bangladesh is likely to increase in the days to come as the intelligence agencies have found numerous connections of the leaders of the Islamist group with other anti-government entities, top government sources have said.The government initiated tough legal action against Hefazat in the wake of widespread acts of violence and vandalism by the group…

04/26/2021 Pakistan (International Christian Concern) – The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) released their 2021 report last Wednesday making their official recommendations to the Department of State on which countries should be labeled as Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) and which should be added to the Special Watch List. Pakistan was once again recommended for CPC status, with the report sighting worsening religious freedom conditions for Christians, Sikhs, Ahmadis, and other religious minorities. “Religious freedom conditions in Pakistan continued to worsen. The government systematically enforced blasphemy and anti-Ahmadiyya laws and failed to protect religious minorities from abuses…

Bangladesh Nationalist Party secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Monday alleged that the government was taking advantage by creating a ‘crisis’ in the Qawmi-madrasa-based Islamist organisation in the wake of dissolution of the central committee of Hefazat-e-Islam. ‘As a political party, we think the government has created a crisis in Hefazat and it’s now taking advantage of it,’ he said. The BNP secretary general came up with the remark while speaking at a virtual press conference. Stating that their party has no relation with Hefazat, Fakhrul said BNP believes in going to power in a peaceful manner through a…

LAHORE: Political leaders, including government allies, have rejected the report of the one-member minority commission that recommended exclusion of Islamic teachings and history from textbooks other than Islamiyat. Former top cop Dr Shoaib Suddle as a one-man minority commission last week suggested a uniform curriculum across the country and, for the purpose, omitting write-ups on Islamic teachings and Islamic history from textbooks except in Islamiyat. Governor Chaudhry Sarwar and Punjab Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Parvez Elahi expressed concern and said the recommendations would not go down well with the majority of the population. A press release quoted them as expressing these…

Nigeria (International Christian Concern) –Boko Haram terrorists attacked the community of Mainok in Borno state on Sunday, seizing control of the town. “Their motorcade moved straight to the location of Kafela primary school as they started sporadic shooting.” A resident told Daily Trust Nigeria, “We are currently indoors praying for our safety, that’s all I can say for now.” The number of casualties is currently unknown as terrorists continue to wreak havoc on the town. “It was gathered that some ISWAP fighters, on sighting the military jets, fled to Minok primary school to escape air troops’ strikes and burnt a…

Mamunul Haque, an influential leader of hardcore Islamist group Hefazat-e-Islam in Bangladesh, along with other leaders, has confessed to wanting to turn Bangladesh into a Taliban state like Afghanistan if they came to power. Haque was arrested by Dhaka police last week on the charges of instigating violence, attempt to murder, assault and vandalism. Along with other influential leaders from across the country, Haque had formed an organization called ‘Rabetatul Waizin Bangladesh’, to dethrone the government in power and establish a Taliban state, informed a top detective official. Funded by Islamic forces, radical Islamist outfits like Hefazat-e-Islam and Jamaat-e-Islami, this…

Mahir Abrar: Al-Ma’arri was an Arabic poet, philosopher, and writer who lived (December 973 – May 1057) during the Islamic Golden Age under the Abbasid era in Aleppo, which is in modern Syria. In 2019, Al-Ma’arri statue was vandalized in Syria by the al-Nusra Front, about a thousand years after his lifetime, because Al-Ma’arri was a rationalist, someone we might call a “nastik” (atheist) in Bangladesh. According to some accounts, he was a deist. He questioned Islam and its practises; at the same time he was critical of Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism. He was an ethical vegetarian who was also…

Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury: During interrogation, arrested leaders of pro-Caliphate militancy group Hefazat-e-Islam have provided bone-chilling information on their nefarious agenda of turning Bangladesh into a caliphate by unseating the democratically elected government. They also have revealed – how Hefazat leaders were capitalizing the poor madrassa students and making millions of takas. Hefazat-e-Islam was actively pushing forward a dangerous agenda of turning madrassa students towards militancy by provoking them with false interpretation of the Holy Quran. In the eyes of Hefazat men, democracy is “rule of Satan” and democratic forces are “enemies of Allah”.  According to intelligence sources, Hefazat-e-Islam leaders…

Leader of different political parties, included in Hefajat-e-Islam, have tried to materialise their party agenda under the banner of the Islamist group and hatched conspiracies to topple the government in 2013 and March this year, investigators have said.   Though Hefajat claims they are a non-political organisation, many of its leaders are affiliated with different political parties that have their separate agenda, Mahbub Alam, joint commissioner of Detective Branch of Dhaka Metropolitan Police, said today. For all latest news, follow The Daily Star’s Google News channel. He said these leaders conspired in 2013 to oust the government through Hefajat. Similar…