Nisha Biswal in city
Nisha Desai Biswal, US assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs, arrived here yesterday on a three-day visit.
She will have meetings with top government officials and leaders of opposition party, business community, labour and RMG sectors.
She will also meet BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia at her Gulshan residence at 6:00pm today, Khaleda's press wing member Sayrul Kabir Khan told UNB.
BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, party chairperson's advisers Riaz Rahman and Sabihuddin Ahmed; and Vice-chairman Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury will be present, he added.
This is Biswal's second trip to Bangladesh as she had been here soon after taking over as the assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs on October 21 last year.
The US official will travel to Bangladesh Institute of Peace Support Operation Training (BIPSOT) in Gazipur before leaving Dhaka tomorrow, according the US embassy in Dhaka.
Before her arrival here, Biswal attended the 18th Saarc Summit in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Terming the January 5 parliamentary election a “deeply flawed” one, Biswal in February said this could have serious ramifications for stability in Bangladesh and the region as the election did not credibly express the will of Bangladeshi people.
“I want to state very clearly that our interest in holding new elections is to ensure a free and fair process,” she said in her opening remark at a fresh hearing on the prospects of democratic reconciliation and workers' rights in Bangladesh at the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in Washington in February.
The United States, said Biswal, has not taken sides or played favourites in who should lead the country. Decision should be left to the Bangladesh people, whose voices were not fairly heard on January 5, she added.
As the assistant secretary, Biswal oversees US foreign policy with India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, the Maldives, Bhutan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Tajikistan.
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