Ashraf's JSD comments irk Hasina

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, also the president of ruling Awami League, has expressed frustration over her party's General Secretary Syed Ashraful Islam's recent remarks laying into Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal.

She also said Ashraf should not have made such remarks in the present situation, said sources.

Hasina was talking to some AL leaders, including a minister, who met her in parliament on Tuesday night, said the sources, adding that she did not, however, discuss the issue with Ashraf.

On Monday, Ashraf said his party may have to repent for inducting a JSD member into the cabinet, and accused the JSD of making grounds for Bangabandhu's assassination.

The AL leader went to the UK on a personal visit yesterday, said sources.

JSD President and Information Minister Hasanul Haque Inu yesterday said it was not the time for "mudslinging" between the 14-party alliance partners. Rather, he added, it was the time for stamping out militancy completely and protecting the people.

"All-out and combined efforts are needed for ensuring security of the country and its people. The 14-party under the leadership of Sheikh Hasina is working together in this regard," the minister said while talking to reporters at the Secretariat.

"This is not the time for history lessons. History itself will judge it [the issue]," he said.

Yesterday, several AL leaders also discussed the remarks of Ashraf. All of them stressed the need for keeping the alliance's unity intact.

AL presidium member Obaidul Quader said the political unity in the combine was forged considering the present reality.

"Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina hasn't forgotten the history... the political unity [in the 14-party alliance] had been forged for the greater need of time," he said at a programme in Savar.

Quader, also the road transport and bridges minister, said, "Anybody's remarks in this regard were absolutely his or her own."

Addressing a programme at the AL central office on Bangabandhu Avenue, Mohammed Nasim, another presidium member of the party, said the 14-party combine was a platform of secular parties.

"The alliance's unity is rock solid and it will remain stable in future," said Nasim, also the health minister.

AL Joint General Secretary Mahbubul Alam Hanif said the AL-led combine would stay together under the leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. He also said the alliance would resist all conspiracies of the BNP-Jamaat combine.

Meanwhile, the BNP yesterday blamed the JSD for creating anarchy in the country after the Liberation War and demanded trial of JSD chief Inu.

"The Awami League general secretary [Ashraf] has said exactly what his party leaders and activists want to say," BNP Senior Secretary General Rizvi Ahmed said at a briefing at his party's Nayapaltan office.

He alleged that a group of JSD leaders had a hand in destructive activities and killings carried out across the country after the war in 1971.