DHAKA, Dec 24: Bangladesh police arrested at least 663 people nationwide within 24 hours under Operation Devil Hunt Phase-2, a large-scale crackdown aimed at restoring law and order and recovering illegal firearms, according to senior police officials.
Assistant Inspector-General AHM Shahadat Hossain confirmed that nine firearms were seized during the operation. As part of routine checks, police searched more than 26,800 motorcycles and 26,500 vehicles, seizing 342 illegal motorcycles.
The second phase of the operation was launched nationwide on December 13 by the interim government ahead of the February 2026 elections to prevent subversive activities involving illegal arms.
Authorities said the decision followed a high-level law and order meeting held a day after the shooting of Inqilab Mancha spokesperson Sharif Osman Hadi.
Last week alone, police arrested over 4,200 people under the same operation. According to human rights group Mandhaka Sanskriti Foundation, more than 11,300 people were detained during earlier phases between February 8 and February 28, many of them linked to the former Awami League government.
The Awami League has accused the Muhammad Yunus-led interim administration of political vendetta, alleging a sharp rise in violence and warning of growing “mob terrorism” since it assumed power.
Yunus celebrates economic independence in US while B’desh remains repressed: Activist
Exiled Bangladeshi author and human rights activist Taslima Nasreen has accused interim government chief advisor Muhammad Yunus of overseeing widespread human rights abuses in Bangladesh.
Speaking on X, Nasreen cited reports of mob violence, lynching, and communal attacks occurring frequently, with women facing rape, intimidation, and suppression while Yunus promotes women’s economic empowerment internationally.
Nasreen criticized Yunus, founder of the New York-based Grameen America, for benefiting financially from the indebtedness of poor Hispanic and Black women in the US while Bangladeshi garment workers suffer under oppressive conditions, including violence, factory closures, and forced restrictions.
She argued that his celebration of “economic independence” in the U.S. contrasts sharply with the repression of women in Bangladesh, calling it “moral duplicity.”
Highlighting ethical and legal concerns, Nasreen urged donors and governments supporting Grameen America to reconsider their backing, asserting that Yunus’s leadership may enable crimes against religious and ethnic minorities that could amount to genocide.
She called on individuals, institutions, and funding bodies to demand that Yunus be severed from all affiliated organisations, warning that continued association constitutes complicity in ongoing human rights violations. (IANS)
