KEY POINTS
- India-Bangladesh ties strained after the ouster of Sheikh Hasina.
- Yunus accuses India of running a propaganda campaign against his administration.
- Hindu activists storms Bangladesh’s consulate in India.
DHAKA: India’s senior diplomat was in Bangladesh on Monday to defuse tensions between the two neighbours following the ouster of ex-premier Sheikh Hasina in a student-led revolution.
India has always backed Hasina’s rule who is currently in New Delhi where she took refuge after her removal, despite Bangladesh saying it would press her extradition.
Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, who was nominated the leader of an interim government and tasked with implementing democratic reforms, has condemned acts of “Indian aggression” that he alleged were aimed at destabilising his administration.
Vikram Misra, the secretary of India’s foreign ministry, arrived in Dhaka on Monday for the first in-person meeting between top officials of both countries since Hasina’s ouster.
“It needs to be recognized that there has been a qualitative shift in the relationship between the two countries,” Bangladesh’s foreign minister Touhid Hossain said Sunday, ahead of Misra’s visit.
Yunus had faced numerous criminal proceedings during Hasina’s tenure. He has been a vocal critic of India for supporting Hasina’s rule.
The leader of Bangladesh’s interim set-up has accused India of exaggerating the scale of the violence and running a “propaganda campaign” against his administration. Bangladesh has seen numerous anti-India street demonstrations since Hasina’s ouster.
On Sunday hundreds of activists from the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) marched towards the Indian High Commission in Dhaka but dispersed peacefully after police blocked their route.
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They were protesting against the attempted storming of a Bangladeshi consulate in India by Hindu activists a few days ago.
Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha (BSS), the country’s national news agency quoted India’s external affairs secretary Vikram Misri as saying that Delhi found no reason for disruption of the ties with Bangladesh’s August political change.
The Hindu reported that foreign secretary Vikram Misri on Monday conveyed India’s “concerns” about “recent developments” regarding the safety and security of minority religious communities in Bangladesh and urged the interim government in Bangladesh to follow a “constructive approach”.
It said that apart from the arrest of the Vaishnav monk Das, India-Bangladesh relations have been caught in a turbulent phase over the presence of former PM Hasina in New Delhi.
