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At least 100 people were injured in violent clashes between supporters of Bangladesh's ruling party and demonstrators protesting against quotas for coveted government jobs, police said. The quota system reserves more than half of the best-paying public sector jobs, hundreds of thousands of government jobs in total, for certain groups, including the children of fighters in the 1971 war for independence from Pakistan. Critics say the system favors children of pro-government groups who support Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who won a fourth consecutive term in January in parliamentary elections boycotted by the opposition.
Bangladesh's Supreme Court temporarily suspended the quotas last week, but protesters vowed to continue rallying until the parts of the system they oppose are completely scrapped. Hundreds of quota opponents and students from the ruling Awami League party fought for hours on the campus of Dhaka University on Monday, police and witnesses reported.
They threw stones, fought with sticks and beat each other with iron rods. Witnesses said some carried machetes while others threw incendiary devices, AFP reported. "They clashed with sticks and threw stones at each other," police officer Mostagilur Rahman told AFP. Nahid Islam, national coordinator for the anti-quota protests, said their "peaceful procession" had been attacked by people carrying sticks, clubs and stones.
"They beat up our women protesters. At least 150 students, including 30 women, were injured and the condition of 20 students is serious," he said. Shahinul Shumi, 26, a student who was injured, said the protesters were taken by surprise. "We were carrying out a peaceful procession," she said from her hospital bed at Dhaka Medical Hospital. "Suddenly, the Chhatra League (the ruling party's student wing) attacked us with sticks, machetes, iron rods and bricks."
Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud said there had been an "attempt to exploit the sentiments of young students and turn the anti-quota movement into an anti-national movement." "Quota reform" Protests by thousands of students across Bangladesh began on Sunday night and continued into Monday, according to local media reports, after Hasina said the quotas were a matter for the Supreme Court. Hasina also reportedly likened the protesters to Razakar fighters who collaborated with Pakistan's army in the war for independence. Students from more than a dozen universities demonstrated on Sunday evening against Hasina's comments and the quota system, and continued their protests into the early hours of Monday.
Police said on Monday that hundreds of opponents of the quota from several private universities joined a protest in Dhaka, paralyzing traffic near the US Embassy for more than four hours. "Around 200 students were squatting or standing on the streets," Deputy Chief of Police Hasanuzzaman Molla told AFP.
According to local media, Hasina, 76, criticized those who oppose the quota for the descendants of freedom fighters at a press conference at her official residence. But the students protested, demanding that only the 6 percent quota for government jobs that supports ethnic minorities and the disabled should be maintained. "We want the quota system to be reformed," said a Dhaka University student, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.
