Politics
Bangladesh readies for general election, worries among Hasina supporters
GOPALGANJ: Bangladesh is preparing for the first election since the overthrow of Sheikh Hasina, but supporters of her banned Awami League (AL) are struggling to decide whether to shift their allegiance.
In Gopalganj, south of the capital Dhaka and a strong bastion of Hasina’s iron-grip rule, residents are grappling with an election without the party that shaped their political lives for decades.
“Sheikh Hasina may have done wrong — she and her friends and allies — but what did the millions of Awami League supporters do?” said tricycle delivery driver Mohammad Shahjahan Fakir, 68, adding that he would not vote.
“Why won’t the ‘boat’ symbol be there on the ballot paper?” he said, referring to AL’s former election icon.
The Muslim-majority nation of 170 million people will hold elections on February 12, its first since the uprising.
Hasina, who crushed opposition parties during her rule, won landslide victories in Gopalganj in every election since 1991.
After a failed attempt to cling to power and a brutal crackdown on protesters, she was ousted as prime minister in August 2024 and fled to India.
She was sentenced to death in absentia for crimes against humanity by a court in Dhaka in November, and her former ruling party, once the country’s most popular, has been outlawed.
Human Rights Watch has condemned the AL ban as “draconian”.
“There’s so much confusion right now,” said Mohammad Shafayet Biswas, 46, a banana and betel leaf seller in Gopalganj.
“A couple of candidates are running from this constituency — I don’t even know who they are.”
As a crowd gathered in the district, one man shouted: “Who is going to the polling centres? We don’t even have our candidates this time.”
‘Dehumanise’
Hasina’s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding president of Bangladesh, hailed from Gopalganj and is buried in the town.
Statues of Rahman have been torn down nationwide, but in Gopalganj, murals and statues are well-maintained.
Since Hasina’s downfall, clashes have broken out during campaigning by other parties, including one between police and AL supporters in July 2025, after which authorities filed more than 8,000 cases against residents.
Sazzad Siddiqui, a professor at Dhaka University, believes voter turnout in Gopalganj could be the lowest in the country.
“Many people here are still in denial that Sheikh Hasina did something very wrong,” said Siddiqui, who sat on a government commission formed after the 2025 unrest.
“At the same time, the government has constantly tried to dehumanise them.”
This time, frontrunners include candidates from the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Jamaat-e-Islami.
Both are from Hasina’s arch-rivals, now eyeing power. “I am going door to door,” BNP candidate SM Zilany, 57, told AFP, saying many would-be voters had never had a candidate canvass for their backing.
“I promise them I will stand by them.”
Zilany said he had run twice against Hasina — and was struck down by 34 legal cases he claimed had been politically motivated.
This time, he said that there was “a campaign to discourage voters from turning up”.
Jamaat candidate MM Rezaul Karim, 53, said that under Hasina, the party had been driven underground.
“People want a change in leadership,” Karim told AFP, saying he was open to all voters, whatever their previous loyalties.
“We believe in coexistence; those involved in crimes should be punished; others must be spared,” Karim said. Those once loyal to Hasina appear disillusioned.
Some say they had abandoned the AL, but remain unsure whom to support.
“I am not going to vote,” said one woman, who asked not to be named.
“Who should I vote for except Hasina? She is like a sister.”
ABU DHABI: The United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque recorded a historic surge in visitors in 2025, welcoming nearly seven million worshippers and tourists, the highest annual figure since the landmark opened.
According to official figures, the total marked a 4% increase compared with 2024, reflecting the mosque’s growing status as one of the Middle East’s leading religious and cultural destinations.
More than 1.53 million people performed prayers at the mosque during the year, while over 2.4 million visitors attended for iftar and religious activities.
Foreign visitors accounted for 82% of the total, while UAE residents made up 18%. By region, Asia ranked first with 49% of visitors, followed by Europe at 33% and North America at 11%.
During Ramadan and Eid ul Fitr, more than 1.89 million worshippers and guests visited the mosque, where over 2.6 million iftar and suhoor meals were distributed as part of humanitarian initiatives.
The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque Centre also organised more than 4,000 cultural tours and programmes and hosted 335 high-level delegations throughout the year, reinforcing its role as a global hub for faith, tourism and intercultural dialogue.
WASHINGTON: Travel misery was set to continue Sunday as a powerful snowstorm blasted southern US states, bringing subzero temperatures to regions not accustomed to the deadly winter conditions.
The latest bout of extreme weather came about a week after a monster storm pummeled a wide swath of the United States, killing more than 100 people and leaving many communities struggling to dig out from snow and ice.
Heavy snow fell in North Carolina and neighbouring states Saturday, as authorities urged residents to stay off the roads and warned oceanfront structures were threatened by the storm.
All of North and South Carolina, and portions of Georgia, eastern Tennessee and Kentucky, as well as southern Virginia were under a winter storm warning.
North Carolina saw 750 car crashes on Saturday, the highway patrol said.
Faust, North Carolina recorded 14.5 inches (37 cm) of snow, while West Critz, Virginia got 12.5 inches. Harrisburg, Tennessee received more than nine inches of accumulation.
In the North Carolina town of Cape Carteret, high winds sent thick snow blowing sideways, prompting the National Weather Service to warn that travel was “Treacherous and Potentially Life-Threatening especially if you become stranded.”
In dramatic footage released by police in Gastonia, North Carolina, a train ploughed at high speed into a semi-truck that had gotten stuck on the tracks, crushing the vehicle. No one was hurt.
The weekend storm forced more than 1,800 flight cancellations Saturday and Sunday at Charlotte Douglas International Airport in North Carolina, a major hub for American Airlines, data from the tracker FlightAware showed.
A 300-strong “snow team” was working to clear runways, taxiways, roads and sidewalks, the airport said Saturday.
More than 600 flights were cancelled Saturday at Atlanta’s international airport, the world’s busiest. About 50 flights in and out of Atlanta were cancelled in the early hours of Sunday.
“An explosively deepening coastal cyclone will continue to bring moderate to heavy snow, high winds, and possibly blizzard conditions for the Carolinas,” the National Weather Service said Saturday.
“An intense surge of arctic air behind the coastal storm will send below freezing temperatures down toward South Florida by Sunday morning.”
Davis, West Virginia recorded the lowest temperature in the lower 48 states on Saturday — a frigid minus 28°F (minus 33°C).
About 156,000 customers remained without power early Sunday, mostly in the south, according to poweroutage.us, with Mississippi, Tennessee and Louisiana hardest hit.
In North Carolina, the National Park Service announced the closure of campgrounds and some beaches at the Outer Banks, a series of barrier islands off the coast of the southern state that are vulnerable to storms.
It said oceanfront structures were threatened, and a section of highway that threads through its dunes was closed.
In Mississippi, Governor Tate Reeves said the US Army Corps of Engineers helped to install generators at critical sites, and authorities were opening 79 shelters and warming centres across the state.
The freezing weather forced Nasa to postpone a key fueling test over the weekend of the 322-foot (98-metre) rocket that is on the Cape Canaveral launch pad in Florida.
That in turn is likely to push back by at least a couple of days a planned manned Moon flyby slated for this month.
US President Donald Trump has said India will buy Venezuelan oil, as opposed to purchasing oil from Iran.
“We’ve already made that deal, the concept of the deal,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One as he travelled to his vacation home in Florida from Washington.
Reuters reported on Friday that the United States has told Delhi it could soon resume purchases of Venezuelan oil to help replace imports of Russian oil, citing three people familiar with the matter.
India has not been importing significant amounts of Iranian oil due to US sanctions, but became a major buyer of Russian oil after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 triggered Western sanctions that drove down its price.
Trump in August doubled duties on imports from India to 50% to pressure New Delhi to stop buying Russian oil, and earlier this month said the rate could rise again if it did not curb its purchases.
However, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent signaled in January that the additional 25% tariff on Indian goods could be removed, given what he called a sharp reduction in Indian imports of Russian oil.
Trump in March 2025 also imposed a 25% tariff on countries buying Venezuelan oil, including India. The US government this week lifted some sanctions on Venezuela’s oil industry to make it easier for US companies to sell its crude oil.
Trump’s comments on Saturday appeared to reflect continued improvement in US-India relations, which have been tense throughout the past year.
Trump also said China could make a deal with the US to buy Venezuelan oil.
“China is welcome to come in and would make a great deal on oil,” Trump said, without providing any details.
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