At least five people killed during anti-quota protests in Bangladesh

Demonstrators demand end to scheme that prioritises families of veterans of 1971 independence war.

At least five people have been killed in Bangladesh during violent clashes between rival student groups over quotas for coveted government jobs, police officials said.

On Tuesday, thousands of riot police were patrolling university campuses across the country in an effort to avert any violence. Police said they used tear gas and rubber bullets in Rangpur, in northwestern Bangladesh, to break up the demonstrations.

“We had to use rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse the unruly students who were hurling stones at us,” said Rangpur Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mohammad Moniruzzaman said.

“We heard a protesting student died after he was taken to hospital. It was not immediately clear how he died,” he added.

Three people were also killed in the port city of Chittagong.

“All three had bullet injuries,” Chittagong Medical College Hospital director Mohammad Taslim Uddin told AFP.

“Some 35 people were injured,” Uddin added.

Moreover, in the northern city of Rangpur, police commissioner Mohammad Moniruzzaman told AFP that a student had been killed in clashes.

Rangpur Medical College hospital director Yunus Ali said the “student was brought dead to the hospital by other students”, adding that “his body had injury marks”.

Students in Dhaka have been demanding an end to the quota reserved for family members of veterans who fought in Bangladesh’s 1971 war of independence, which allows them to take up 30 percent of government jobs.

On Tuesday, protesters gathered in front of the university’s official residence of the vice chancellor and accused the Bangladesh Chhatra League, a student wing of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s