|
WASHINGTON Oct 12: Bangladesh is appealing to the United States to help its police agencies better
fight attacks by Islamic militants, the country's foreign secretary said Tuesday.
Hemayetuddin said Bangladeshi law enforcement officials are poorly equipped, motivated and paid, and
"prove no match to these elements, these criminals." The reference was in part to a string of bombings on
Aug. 17 and Oct. 3 that left four people dead and injured dozens across the South Asian country.
"We need help in tracking down these people and eliminating them. This is what the government is trying to
do. We'll do it if you come and help us," he said at a gathering at the Woodrow Wilson International Center
for Scholars, a Washington think-tank.
Authorities blamed the attacks on Islamic radicals looking to establish Islamic rule in Muslim Bangladesh,
which is governed largely by secular laws. Police have arrested hundreds of suspects, including some senior
clerics, but leaders of the banned Islamic groups remain fugitives.
The Bangladeshi Ambassador to United States, Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury, said his government has been
talking with U.S. government officials about extending cooperation on police training and getting better
equipment and technology to fight militants.
The ambassador said the talks are still young and declined to detail specifics. The efforts are part of a
"continuous process ... to draw up a more specific long-term cooperation programme, which will include
training, financing, funding and provision of equipment from the United States."
Foreign secretary Hemayetuddin also praised his country for expanding rights for women, providing
microcredit to millions of poor, cleaning water supplies and serving as one of the world's strongest Muslim-
majority democracies. The microcredit idea, providing very small business loans to the poor, mainly
women, for repayment at low interest, began in Bangladesh.
All this success has come, he said, while the government fights crushing poverty and overcrowding.
Bangladesh has 140 million people, a country a little larger than Greece, about half of whom live on less
than US$1 (euro.83) a day.
|