& çâÌæÚUæð´ ·¤è ¥ôÚU Îð¹Ùæ ÁæÚUè ÚU¹ð´ ¥ÍæüÌ ¥ÂÙð ÜÿØ ÂÚU ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´Ð ãæÚU Ù ×æÙð´, €UØô´ç·¤ ·¤æ× ·¤ÚUÙð âð ¥æÂ·¤ô ©gðàØ ·¤è Âýæç# ãôÌè ãñ ¥õÚU ÁèßÙ ·¤æ ¹æÜèÂÙ ÎêÚU ãôÌæ ãñÐ ÖÜð ãè ÁèßÙ ×ð´ ç·¤ÌÙè Öè ·¤çÆÙæ§ü €UØô´ Ù ¥æ°, çÁ™ææâæ ¥õÚU ©ˆâæã ÕÙæ° ÚU¹ð´Ð ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´, ÜÿØ ã×ðàææ ¥æÂ·Ô¤ Âæâ ãôÌð ãñ´ çÁ‹ãð´ ÂæÙð ·Ô¤ çÜ° ÂýØæâ ¥æÂ ·¤Öè Öè àæéM¤ ·¤ÚU â·¤Ìð ãñ´Ð

How many more deaths would I have to see?

Emotion-choked Hasina asks visitors

Staff Correspondent
Horror of deadly grenade attacks on her rally Saturday still haunts the Leader of the Opposition Sheikh Hasina.
Talking to visitors at her residence, Sudha Sadan, Hasina faltered recalling in emotion-choked voice
SEE PAGE 11 COL 7 FROM PAGE 1
that leaders and activists of her party sacrificed their lives to save her.
"I was like sister to some of them and mother to some others. But I have lost them, they are gone forever", Hasina told a delegation of Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists that met her yesterday to express its shock and sympathy.
"How many more deaths would I have to see?" the AL chief posed the question. "Party leaders and workers are like my family members and I spend most of the time with them, instead of my son and daughter," she said.
Hasina also recalled her long memories with critically injured party leader Ivy Rahman and broke into tears. "Along with her (Ivy), I participated in the election campaigns of 1970," she said.
"She (Ivy) has been kept on life support so far as I know", Hasina added.
The AL chief also remembered journalists who were injured in the grenade attacks and said her party would take immediate steps for better treatment of the injured newsmen and, if necessary, would send them abroad.
Talking to a group of reporters, Hasina said leaders of all political parties who believe in democracy and secularism met her and stressed launching a united movement to unseat the BNP-Jamaat-led ruling coalition.
"They have unanimously demanded resignation of the govern-
ment, and have taken the right decision," she said replying to a question.
The government should step down right now, the AL president said. "The people and the country are not safe under the rule of the four-party alliance."
Eminent economists Rehman Sobhan, Debapriya Bhattacharya and Dr Atiur Rahman, Prof Kabir Chowdhury, Justice KM Sobhan, former air chiefs AK Khandaker and Jamal Uddin, Samjtantrik Dal leader Noor-e-Alam Ziku, National Awami Party leader Amina Ahmed and leaders of Dhaka Bar Association met Hasina yesterday.
They expressed condolences for those killed in Saturday's incident and sympathy to the AL chief, who narrowly escaped the attacks.
Business community demands international probe
A delegation of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FBCCI), led by its acting President Kamal Uddin Ahmed, met the opposition leader and expressed deep sympathy to her.
The delegation demanded international probe into the attacks on Hasina and the party rally.
The business leaders also criticised the intelligence agencies' failure that, they noted, results in such incidents.
They said they would observe "Shokrana Day" on Friday at all district units of the organisation across the country to thank the creator that Hasina narrowly escaped the attacks.