Bangladesh unrest: Former PM Sheikh Hasina’s son said, “There is no proof of US involvement, but they are making it clear…”

Sajid Wazed Joy, the son of former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, said that while he/she had no evidence of direct US involvement in student protests in the country, its support for Muhammad Yunus – whom he/she described as a “darling of the West” – indicated possible foreign influence.

Wazed said the West had long supported Yunus, who was appointed head of Bangladesh’s interim government on August 8, and that the West’s readiness to support his/her government had led him/her to believe that foreign involvement in the unrest was obvious.

In an exclusive interview with ANI, Wazed said, “Was the US directly involved? I don’t know. I don’t have any proof. But if you look at the situation and the protests, you will find that the protests were instigated and instigated at every step.”

he/she said that initially the protests were peaceful and were not against the government, but against the court’s decision, which the government also opposed.

“When the protests first started, they were peaceful. Our police were protecting them. The protests were not against government action. Our government had reduced the quota years ago after the first round of protests against the quota. The courts had restored the quota and our government filed an appeal against it. We were waiting for the hearing in the Supreme Court,” he/she said.

Wazed said he/she believed a foreign supplier provided firearms to the protesters.

“The protesters started attacking the police with weapons. Where did these protesters get weapons from? Only a foreign intelligence service can provide weapons to a country. Foreigners have instigated and supported this. I don’t know if it is from the Western side or not, but if you see who these protesters have chosen – Yunus. he/she is a darling of the West. They have been supporting him/her for decades, trying to bring him/her into politics. The West was the first to congratulate and support his/her government. So I think they are making it clear that they probably had some involvement in this whole matter,” Wazed claimed.

Wazed alleged that protesters had distorted Sheikh Hasina’s statement on Razakars, which led to the protests.

he/she said, “Someone twisted my mother’s statement and spread it widely online. They said we don’t want Razakars’ families to get government jobs, but they twisted it and my mother called the protesters Razakars, while she never did that. Obviously, some agency was very active online to inflame the situation. On the night of July 15, when our government appealed to the Supreme Court that we want to cancel the quota, someone started marching at Dhaka University at midnight and shouted slogans, ‘We are Razakars.’ This infuriated our student activists and they attacked the protesters.”

Wazed said the police tried to stop the violence and used excessive force, forcing the government to suspend those officers.

“The police took action to stop the violence. Some policemen used excessive force. Our government immediately asked our student activists, our Bangladesh Chhatra League, to back off, and the violence stopped. We set up a three-member judicial commission to investigate the deaths, and suspended all police officers who used excessive force. So our government did everything to stop the violence. The violence was never ordered by our government; the violence was deliberately instigated by some unknown party,” Wazed said.

The political situation in Bangladesh has been volatile since Sheikh Hasina resigned from her post on August 5 in the wake of growing protests. The protests began in early July over demands for reforms to the quota system, which reserves civil service jobs for specific groups, including descendants of 1971 war veterans.

Nobel laureate and economist Muhammad Yunus, 84, was sworn in as the head of Bangladesh’s interim government on Thursday, August 8, just three days after Sheikh Hasina resigned from her post.