Published on 06:19 PM, September 16, 2017

National unity needed to deal with Rohingya crisis: BNP

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir. Star File photo

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir today underscored the need for forging a nation unity to cope up with the Rohingya crisis on humanitarian ground.

"Rohingya crisis has taken into a horrific turn. We have to forge a national unity to deal with the issue," Fakhrul said while addressing a press conference at the party chief Khaleda Zia's Gulshan office in Dhaka.

The BNP leader also called upon the government to hold talks with all political parties for paving the path of forging the unity on humanitarian aspect of the Rohingya refugees fled into Bangladesh following persecution in Myanmar.

He also blasted the government for not allowing BNP leaders to distribute relief materials among the Rohingya refugees in Cox's Bazar.

Law and order is in mess

Fakhrul expressed grave concern over spreading out the incident of disappearance, abduction and killing across the country and said the situation took an alarming shape due to utter failure the ruling Awami League.

Claiming that there is no security of people in the country, Fakhrul said around 300 leaders and activists of Jatiyatabadi Juba Dal have so far been "disappeared".

"Consequence of such heinous acts will be very cruel," the BNP leader warned.

As part of the "plan of the government to split BNP-led 20-party alliance", M M Aminur Rahman, secretary general of Bangladesh Kalyan Party, a component of the 20-party alliance has been "forced disappeared", Fakhrul said.

"We are intact and will remain the same in future. Earlier, the same attempt was taken to split the alliance but failed," he added.  

The government's motive behind the "disappearance" is to thwart the moral strengthen of the 20-party alliance ahead of the upcoming general election, the BNP leader said.

Demanding whereabouts of all missing leaders of the 20-party alliance in Aminur Rahman, Fakhrul said it is the government and its law enforcement agencies' moral responsibility to trace the missing people.