Sajeeb Wazed Joy sees ‘ulterior motive’ of US Embassy in Dhaka behind Priya Saha’s remarks

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s son and ICT affairs adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy has slammed the US embassy over Priya Saha’s controversial remarks to Donald Trump about the supposed persecution of religious minorities in Bangladesh.

In his first Facebook post after a post-election hiatus, Joy pointed to an ‘ulterior motive’ of the embassy and said, “It is no secret that the US Embassy is decidedly anti-Awami League.”

“Fortunately for us, President Trump and his administration have a very different policy of non-intervention in foreign affairs. They are also not so stupid to believe such a ridiculous claim,” he wrote.

Saha, an organising secretary of the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council, attended a ministerial meeting on advancing religious freedom at the White House in Washington on July 19.

After identifying herself as a Bangladeshi, she was seen telling President Donald Trump that 37 million people of minority groups have disappeared from Bangladesh. She also told the president that her land had been grabbed by Muslim fundamentalists and sought his help so that minority groups could live peacefully in Bangladesh.

A video of the meeting subsequently went viral on social media and sparked widespread outrage back home. The US Embassy in Dhaka sent her for the meeting hosted by the Department of State. The embassy told bdnews24.com that they do not restrict participants’ freedom to express views in US sponsored event.

Joy also referred to that embassy comment in his post.

“She was a member of a delegation selected by the US Embassy in Dhaka.  After much criticism the US Embassy finally issued a statement today. The Embassy stated they do not restrict participants."

“Which is fine, but why would they not refute an obviously false and outrageous statement made by one of their selected participants to their own Head of State?"

He continued: “This tells me the US Embassy is the one that had an ulterior motive here. They picked Priya Saha because they knew she would make this outrageous statement.

“The only logical outcome of making such a claim to the US President is to build demand for a military intervention in the region on humanitarian grounds. This ties in with another US Congressman's recent statement that Bangladesh should take over Rakhine state."

“It is no secret that the US Embassy is decidedly anti-Awami League,” he wrote. “They have always hosted Jamaat and war criminals at all their events. With their support of Priya Saha's statement they now appear to be plotting a direct takeover of our country.”

Joy said after the last elections he had taken a bit of a break and did not post much on his Facebook page. Recent events, however, warrant an observation, he said, before analysing Saha’s claim.

“Some of you may have seen the ridiculous claim that Priya Saha made to United States President Donald Trump.

“She claimed that 3 Crore 70 lakh minorities, or almost 4 Crore, have disappeared!"

“That is more than ten times the number of our martyrs in our Liberation War, or almost as many people as were killed in World War 2. Yet this happened without anyone even knowing about it? Did 37 million people just vanish without a trace?”