Reviving BIMSTEC and the Bay of Bengal region

    Constantino Xavieris, Fellow at the Foreign Policy Studies, at Brookings India, in New Delhi/BDnews24 Despite attracting growing attention as the strategic heart of the Indo-Pacific, the Bay of Bengal remains one of the world’s least integrated regions, with abysmal levels of connectivity and formidable barriers to cooperation. To overcome these divides and foster regionalism, Bangladesh…

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      NKorea still ‘serious & imminent threat’: Japan

      AFP: North Korea still poses a “serious and imminent threat”, Japan said Tuesday in its first annual defence review since tensions eased on the Korean peninsula. Japan’s 2018 defence white paper also took aim at China’s rise as a military power, saying Beijing was sparking “strong security concerns in the region and international community, including…

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        Barapukuria coal scam: ACC grills eight Petrobangla officials

        Kabir Humayun: The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) has quizzed eight officials of Petrobangla over the disappearance of coal from the Barapukuria plant. ACC spokesperson Pranab Kumar Bhattachariya said Shamsul Alam, Deputy Director and Investigation Officer of ACC, interrogated them at the anti-graft watchdog’s headquarters yesterday, reports bdnews24.com. The eight officials include Petrobangla’s General Manager (Mine Operation)…

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          Businesswoman Mahjabin gets bail

          Desk Report: A Dhaka court yesterday granted bail to Faria Mahjabin, owner of Nerdy Bean Coffee Haus in Dhanmondi, in a case filed over “spreading rumours on social media platforms” during the recent student movement for safe roads, reports The Daily Star. Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Md Aminul Haque passed the order after her lawyer…

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            Villages under ‘development’ assault . . .

            Syed Badrul Ahsan, Editor-in-Charge, The Asian Age : Bangladesh’s villages need to be saved from ‘development’. There must be laws, those which civilized societies observe everywhere, that will ensure that no individual or group will mar the traditional structure of the village through steps that are a clear extension of lopsided urban planning. In simple…

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              Imtiaz Habib, a noted Shakespeare scholar, dies

              M Humayun Kabir: Professor Imtiaz Habib, an eminent scholar who taught a generation of students Shakespeare at home and abroad, has died in the United States. He was 69. The English Department of Virginia-based Old Dominion University where he was a teacher until his death, said this on its Facebook page, reports bdnews24.com. “It is…

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                FM: Canada will always stand up for human rights

                MEMO: Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland yesterday refused to retreat in her country’s row with Saudi Arabia over the human rights situation in the kingdom. “Canada will always defend human rights around the world… including women’s rights,” Freeland said at an annual gathering of ambassadors in the German capital, Berlin, without specifically referring to Saudi…

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