Bangladesh ex-minister arrested

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/world/south_asia/6333993.stm

Version 0 of 1.

The former forest and environment minister in Bangladesh, Tariq-ul Islam, has been arrested.

This takes the number of arrested former ministers to nine since a state of emergency was declared in January.

Sources in Bangladesh's interim government say the ex-ministers face questioning about corruption charges.

The state of emergency was triggered by weeks of pre-election opposition protests and violence. The poll planned for 22 January has been postponed.

On Monday, 19 politicians, including the eight ministers arrested earlier, were put in police custody for a month.

Household names

Mr Islam served in the government of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia. He was detained during raids at his home in the western district of Jessore. No reason has been given yet for his detention.

It comes as the home ministry issued a statement saying the government was stepping up a drive against corruption and violence, the Associated Press news agency reports. The statement made no reference to the recent arrests.

The other former ministers were picked up in joint police, army and paramilitary raids across the capital over the weekend.

They are household names, including, for example, Nasmul Huda and Mohammed Nasim, both former government ministers from each of the two main political parties.

Their detention is receiving widespread coverage in the press and broadcast media.

Some newspapers are reporting that up to 100 other big political names have gone into hiding since the raids began early on Sunday morning.

The BBC's John Sudworth in Dhaka says sources in the emergency rule government, that many believe was helped into power by the military, say the arrests have been carried out in connection with corruption allegations.

Shortly after his appointment, the head of the new interim administration, Fakhruddin Ahmed, pledged to cut down hard on the graft that he said was poisoning the country's political culture.

The police say they have arrested more than 30,000 people since he took office.

The state of emergency was declared after political in-fighting and violence over the allegations of vote-rigging which forced the postponement of last month's general election.

The government says its primary purpose is to restore democracy and it has now appointed a new election commissioner with the task of reforming the discredited electoral register.