Govt plotting to keep BNP away from polls: Fakhrul

The government is plotting to push the BNP out of Bangladesh's political arena, a party leader has claimed.

"BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia and Senior Vice-Chairman Tarique Rahman are being implicated in false cases. And now, the government is implicating them in Aug 21 grenade attack case," party spokesperson Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir told a discussion in Dhaka on Saturday.

"The objective is simple -- keeping the BNP away from politics and thereby making sure that it cannot contest polls," claimed Fakhrul.

Khaleda's BNP and her allies boycotted the Jan 5 national polls and have since been pressing for an early election.

Vernacular 'Amar Desh' organised Saturday's discussion marking the 500th day of its acting Editor Mahmudur Rahman's incarceration.

Fakhrul said the BNP had always condemned the Aug 21 grenade attack on an Awami League rally that killed 24 people and injured over 500 others.

On the 10th anniversary of the attack, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina alleged that BNP chief Khaleda, who was the prime minister at the time of the attack, her son Tarique and Cabinet members were involved with the 2004 attack designed to eliminate her.

The BNP leader claimed the government was implicating Tarique with the attack only to "mislead the people".