Forces against Liberation War still active, trying to malign country : Bangladesh minister

Bangladesh State Minister for Foreign Affairs Mohammed Shahriar Alam Saturday said forces opposed to the 1971 Liberation War are still active both within and outside the country and have been hatching conspiracies to malign it.He was speaking on the violent attacks on the minority Hindu community in Bangladesh during Durga Puja.

Bangladesh State Minister for Foreign Affairs Mohammed Shahriar Alam Saturday said forces opposed to the 1971 Liberation War are still active both within and outside the country and have been hatching conspiracies to malign it.

He was speaking on the violent attacks on the minority Hindu community in Bangladesh during Durga Puja. ''Those who had opposed our freedom, the Liberation War are still active in our country and outside it. The forces and the platforms have hatched a conspiracy to disturb the peace and malign of our country,'' he said.

''You can very well understand how in a planned way fake photos were circulated to flare up tensions in the country,'' he said at the sidelines of a book launch programme at the Bangladesh Deputy High Commission here.

Violence had erupted in pockets of Bangladesh in October over an alleged icident of blasphemy at a Durga Puja pavilion at Cumilla, around 100 km from Dhaka, following which paramilitary forces were deployed in many affected areas.

Speaking at the event, Alam lauded the democratic values of his country and hailed the bilateral ties between India and Bangladesh.

''There are countries (Pakistan) which started their journey along with us, but in the last 75 years of its being you will hardly find a democratically elected government completing its full term. But on the other hand, you have Bangladesh where Sheikh Hasina is the longest serving democratically elected female head of the state. This is the difference and strength of our democratic values,'' he said.

Later, he told reporters that visa services will be shifted from the deputy high commission office here to a different place and a private party will handle the work.

''In most of the foreign missions you won't find visa and consular services in the same building. The visa services will be privatised as has already been done in our other missions in other countries. As we have assigned a private party to look into the visa services, there will be a service charge on it. But it will be either less or the same as that India charges for visas,'' he said.

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