Dhaka City police chief promises to curb roiling violence in one more week

The Dhaka Metropolitan Police chief has promised to bring life to normal in the next one week amid deadly arson and petrol bomb attacks during the BNP-led alliance's nationwide transport blockade.

Commissioner Asaduzzaman Mia gave the assurance on Tuesday after the deaths of more than 50 people in spiralling violence across the country.

In the most recent incident, seven people were burned to death and 25 others suffered burns in an arson attack on the Dhaka-Chittagong Highway in Comilla early Tuesday.

Two buses were also torched in the capital earlier in the day.

On Monday, two crude bomb blasts had left two people injured while a double-decker bus of BRTC was set of fire in Dhaka's Mirpur.

The DMP commissioner, however, claimed the situation in Dhaka was 'mostly normal'.

"Every police station in the capital has lists of people who are funding and ordering violence. Raids are on to detain them. The situation will be completely normal within seven days," Mia said.

He claimed that the incidents where miscreants posing as passengers torched buses were 'sporadic'.

After BNP chief Khaleda Zia called the blockade on Jan 5, several government ministers had said the situation would become normal in a matter of weeks.

Since then the situation worsened gradually due to the continuous arson incidents, bomb explosions and acts of sabotages across Bangladesh.

The BNP, which is pressing for a dialogue and a snap general election under a nonpartisan administration, has demanded a solution to what it calls ‘political crisis’. But the ruling Awami League says its only a crisis of law and order.

The DMP chief told reporters at his office on Tuesday that police were very careful in making arrests so that no innocent person was harassed.

Police and other law-enforcing agencies are conducting raids to arrest the troublemakers.

The government, police and Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) have already announced rewards for the citizens who will help them to detain the saboteurs and attackers.

Mia added that police with the help of the people were stopping those who were causing violence amid the blockade and nationwide shutdowns.