Dhaka: Violent protests erupted across Dhaka and other parts of Bangladesh after the death of prominent activist Sharif Osman Hadi was announced on Thursday evening.
Hadi died in a Singapore hospital on Thursday. The 32-year-old had been receiving advanced treatment there after being shot in the head on December 12 by a masked man riding on the back of a motorbike.
He was one of the most prominent figures of the 2024 uprising that ended the autocratic rule of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and sent her fleeing to India.
Protesters stormed the offices of two leading Bangladeshi newspapers, the Bengali-language Prothom Aloi and the English-language Daily Star.
Hadi was an outspoken critic of India, where Hasina remains in self-imposed exile, and protesters accuse the papers of serving Indian interests in the Muslim-majority country.
The crowds set the two newspaper buildings on fire, trapping journalists and other staff inside.
Firefighters rescued several people using ladders, and army contingents were later deployed in front of the buildings amid the protests.
The house of India’s deputy ambassador to Bangladesh was also surrounded by hundreds of people who were trying to demonstrate in a sit-in. Police fired tear gas shells to disperse the crowd, according to local news reports.
Meanwhile, demonstrators used a bulldozer to demolish the regional office of Hasina’s Awami League in the northern city of Rajshahi, footage from private broadcaster Jamuna TV showed.
Similar protests were reported in the port city of Chattogram and the southern city of Khulna.
In a televised address, Muhammad Yunus, head of Bangladesh’s interim administration, announced special prayers at mosques on Friday while urging protesters to stay calm.
“This is a critical moment in our nation’s history when we are making a historic democratic transition,” said the government in a statement. “We cannot and must not allow it to be derailed by those few who thrive on chaos and reject peace.”
Hadi’s “demise is an irreparable loss for the nation,” said Yunus, who declared Saturday a national day of mourning in his honor.
Hadi, a senior leader of the student protest group Inqilab Mancha, was running for a parliament seat in the 2026 national election scheduled for February.
He was shot by masked assailants on a motorbike on December 12 while riding on a rickshaw.
He was airlifted to a hospital in Singapore for treatment at the beginning of this week but died of his injuries on Thursday.
“Despite the best efforts of the doctors…, Mr Hadi succumbed to his injuries,” Singapore’s foreign affairs ministry said in a statement on Thursday.
It added that it was assisting Bangladeshi authorities with repatriating his body.
Bangladeshi police say they have identified both the shooter and the motorbike driver and that they believe both suspects illegally crossed into neighboring India.
Authorities have also offered a reward of five million taka (about $42,000, €36,000) for information leading to their arrest.
Interim leader Yunus has called the shooting a premeditated attack carried out by a powerful network aimed at derailing February’s election.
In the weeks before his shooting, Hadi had said that he was receiving death threats as well as threats of torching his house and raping family members.
