Hundreds of people demonstrated in Bangladesh on Saturday for the second day in a row to protest the death in prison of a writer and demand a return to freedom of expression.
One of the processions, gathering hundreds of students, started from Dhaka University, while the National Press Club organized another march on its side.
All condemn not only the treatment of writer Mushtaq Ahmed, who died Thursday in a high security prison, but also the crackdown on writers, journalists and activists criticizing the government.
They are demanding the repeal of the digital security law, enacted in 2018, which the government uses to quell any criticism.
Friday, a student demonstration was punctuated by incidents with the police. Six people were arrested, police said, while protesters said at least 30 were injured.
Mushtaq Ahmed, 53, writer and crocodile breeder, was arrested in May after criticizing online the government’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. He was charged under this law with spreading rumors and engaging in “anti-state” activity on Facebook.
Prison authorities announced that the writer died Thursday after becoming unwell. According to them, he did not have a serious illness.
“The death of Mushtaq Ahmed is not normal. We believe it is a murder, ”one of the demonstrators, Manisha Chakraborty, told AFP.
According to CPJ, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, the writer managed to get his brother a word out during a court hearing this week saying he was severely abused while in detention. by the police.
Faced with international protests, the authorities announced that they had ordered an investigation “to verify whether there was negligence on the part of the prison staff”.
In a joint statement, thirteen ambassadors stationed in the country, including those of the United States, France, Great Britain, Canada and Germany had expressed “their deep concern”.