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Student protesters in Bangladesh have called for Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus to be named chief adviser of a new interim government after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled the country in the face of a popular uprising.
Sheikh Hasina, who governed the country for a total of two decades, was ousted with startling speed on Monday after weeks of violent protests over an unpopular job quota scheme swelled into a youth-led movement that demanded she step down.
The Dhaka Tribune reported that at least 135 people died on Monday as thousands of protesters demanding Sheikh Hasina quit marched on her residence and took control of the streets of Dhaka, the capital.
Army chief Waker-Uz-Zaman said the military would hold talks with President Mohammed Shahabuddin and political party representatives on forming a new government. Shahabuddin also ordered the release of jailed ex-prime minister Khaleda Zia and student protesters.
“We have decided that an interim government will be formed in which internationally renowned Nobel laureate Dr Muhammad Yunus, who has wide acceptability, will be the chief adviser,” Nahid Islam, an organiser of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, said in a video statement.
“We have spoken to Dr Mohammad Yunus and, at the call of the students and to protect Bangladesh, Dr Muhammad Yunus has decided to take on the responsibility.” Yunus could not be reached for comment.
Yunus, 84, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006, is the founder of pioneering microlender Grameen Bank and one of the south Asian country’s most prominent figures. He has faced multiple court cases as part of what his supporters described as a politically motivated vendetta by Sheikh Hasina, who saw him as a potential rival.
The deposed Bangladeshi leader and her sister Sheikh Rehana arrived at a military base near New Delhi on Monday evening, local media reported. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government, which saw Hasina as an important regional ally, has not commented on her whereabouts.
According to some reports, Sheikh Hasina plans to seek refuge in the UK, where her sister lives and her niece, Tulip Siddiq, is an MP with the ruling Labour party and serves as economic secretary to the Treasury.
However, British officials played down the prospect of Sheikh Hasina being welcomed in the UK, noting there was no provision in the country’s immigration rules allowing somebody — even a fleeing prime minister — to travel to the UK to seek asylum or temporary refuge.
Britain’s policy is to urge anyone seeking international protection to claim asylum in the first safe country they reach as the fastest route to safety, said the officials, who requested anonymity.
Sheikh Hasina’s ousting has thrown Bangladesh’s turbulent politics and struggling economy into further disarray. The prime minister, who claimed a fifth term in power this year after a disputed election, had ruled with an increasingly authoritarian hand.
On Monday, as news of Sheikh Hasina’s flight spread, protesters attacked and looted her former residence, among other buildings, news footage showed, in scenes that recalled the 2022 uprising in Sri Lanka that overthrew president Gotabaya Rajapaksa.
People also attacked statues of Sheikh Hasina’s father, independence hero Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was the subject of a personality cult promoted by the prime minister and her Awami League party.
The protest movement was sparked by a quota system reserving coveted civil service jobs for specific groups, including descendants of veterans who served in the country’s 1971 civil war in which it split from Pakistan. About 300 people were killed in a crackdown on the demonstrations in the weeks before Sheikh Hasina’s resignation.
“There is a lot of anger and frustration and very high expectations that all of the bad things that have been done will be addressed quickly,” said Badiul Alam Majumdar, activist and secretary of Shujan: Citizens for Good Governance, a non-governmental organisation.
“Violence and taking revenge is not acceptable and that needs to stop,” he added. “We have a new beginning.”
Additional reporting by Jyotsna Singh in New Delhi