'Attack on democracy'

Bar Council Vice-Chairman and BNP leader Khandker Mahbub Hossain has said that the police raid at BNP headquarters is an assault on democracy.

“What we have witnessed here today (Saturday) in the name of democracy does not happen even in a barbaric society,” he told reporters after visiting the party’s headquarters at Naya Paltan on Saturday.

The BNP chairperson's advisor went to Naya Paltan leading a delegation of professionals.

Police prevented the delegation from entering the office when it reached there around 1pm. The leaders and journalists were let in only after heated exchanges between the police and the delegation.

BNP office staff apprised Hossain of the whole incident. He was told that police had broken the door to enter the office and ransacked several rooms on the first and second floors.

"We are ashamed to see what has happened here. We didn't see anything like this even in 1971," said the BNP leader.

He blamed the government's 'special group' for the arson and vandalism during the Opposition- backed blockade.

"The ongoing crisis can only be solved if the Prime Minister resigns. I ask the Prime Minister to step down and then initiate for polls."

Meanwhile, Opposition Chief Whip Zainul Abdin Farroque has also condemned the arrest of Ruhul Kabir Rizvi and ransacking of the party office.

"The movement for a non-party government cannot be crushed by such arrests and oppression. I ask the government, there's still time-- stop these oppressive measures and hold the polls under a non-party government. Or else the matter will be resolved on the streets," reads a statement issued by the BNP leader.