AL trying to escalate conflict, violence to stay in power: Rizvi

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has destroyed the national resilience, and the Awami League government under her leadership is provoking the ongoing conflict and violence towards escalation to stay in power, BNP Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi has alleged.

"Every footage of 28 October that has surfaced on social media shows Awami League cadres walking with sticks alongside the police," he said while addressing a virtual press briefing on Saturday.

Rizvi added that the purpose behind the aggression of the "joint force" of law enforcers and Awami League cadres is that they would act as a tool to implement the party's aggression plan in the upcoming elections.

Stating that the police, Jubo League and Chhatra League are jointly dealing with the strike called by the BNP, he said, "Law and order forces and Awami cadres complement each other."

"It is evident from the past precedents of the Awami League that when in power, they consider the country to be their paternal property, and that is why, they nurture the law and order forces as cadre forces of the party, and use them against the opposition," Rizvi said further.

Accusing the prime minister of plotting to remove the BNP by force, Rizvi stated that they [AL leaders] declared on 28 October that they will thwart BNP's programmes by any means, and are now implementing it by taking the lives of BNP leaders and activists in a bloody way.

The senior BNP leader claimed that 176 leaders and activists of the party and its affiliates have been arrested across the country in the past 24 hours until Saturday evening, and a total of 10 leaders and activists, including a journalist, have been killed, and around 8,000 arrested in the anti-government movement since 28 October.