Thousands Demand Bangladesh Opposition Leader's Release

(@ChaudhryMAli88)

Thousands demand Bangladesh opposition leader's release

Dhaka,(APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 10th Sep, 2018 ) :Thousands of opposition supporters staged protests across Bangladesh on Monday demanding immediate release of their leader and three-time former premier Khaleda Zia, jailed early this year for graft.

Zia, 73, is currently on trial on more corruption charges in a makeshift courtroom inside a 19th-century British-built prison where she is the only inmate and in failing health, her lawyers say.

A police official told AFP that some 4,000 activists of the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) joined protests outside the National Press Club at the heart of capital Dhaka.

Thousands more joined similar demonstrations in cities and towns across the country.

But opposition spokesman Fakhrul islam Alamgir has said some 20,000 protesters, many shouting slogans calling Zia's jailing illegal and a sham, turned up at the Dhaka rally.

"We have said the charges against her were false. She should be released immediately and be treated at a private hospital," Alamgir, secretary general of the BNP, told AFP.