Pakistan on Wednesday expressed “solidarity” with the people of Bangladesh and hoped the South Asian country would return to normalcy “peacefully and swiftly” after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina quit this week and fled to India following a violent crackdown on a student-led uprising.
Bangladesh’s president appointed Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, who was recommended by student leaders, as the head of the interim government late on Tuesday and said the remaining members need to be finalized soon to overcome the current crisis and pave way for elections.
“The government and people of Pakistan stand in solidarity with the people of Bangladesh, sincerely hoping for a peaceful and swift return to normalcy,” Foreign Office Spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said in a statement published on state-run APP news agency.
“She also expressed confidence that the resilient spirit and unity of the Bangladeshi people would lead them to a harmonious future.”
The interim government will fill a power vacuum left after Bangladesh’s army chief announced Hasina’s resignation in a televised address on Monday that followed weeks of deadly violence that ripped through the country, killing about 300 people and injuring thousands since July.
Nahid Islam, one of the main leaders of the student movement, told reporters after the president’s announcement that students have recommended 10-15 members for the interim government in an initial list they shared with the president.
Islam said he expects interim government members to be finalized in 24 hours starting from late Tuesday evening. The students’ recommendations for the government include civil society members and also student representatives, Islam said.
Hasina landed in New Delhi on Monday and is staying at a safe house on the outskirts of the capital. Indian media reports have said that she plans to travel onwards to Britain, but the British Home Office has not commented.
Bangladesh was out of a war between India and Pakistan in 1971 in which nearly 3 million people were killed. Its founding father and first prime minister Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, Hasina’s father, was assassinated in 1975 in a military coup which brought in a long period of military rule.
Though democracy was restored slowly by 1990, the country of nearly 170 million people has been rocked by sporadic periods of sectarian or political violence in recent years.
- With inputs from Reuters
