Bangladesh authorities detain student protest leaders in hospital

Home minister says three student leaders taken into custody ‘for their own security’ and were being questioned.

Bangladeshi authorities have taken three student leaders, who helped coordinate rallies against government job quotas, from a hospital following days of deadly nationwide protests and state-imposed curfews and communication blocks.

Officers reportedly forced the discharge of three leaders of the Students Against Discrimination movement from the Gonoshasthaya Kendra hospital in the capital, Dhaka, on Friday.

Police had initially denied that Nahid Islam, Abu Bakar Mazumdar and Asif Mahmud were taken into custody. But Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan subsequently told reporters: “They themselves were feeling insecure. They think that some people were threatening them.”

While Khan did not confirm whether the three had been formally arrested, he told reporters late on Friday, “We think for their own security they needed to be interrogated to find out who was threatening them. After the interrogation, we will take the next course of action.”

Security forces also picked up a ward boy from the hospital in the Dhanmondi area and seized the phones of Islam’s mother and wife, along with those of Mazumdar and Mahmud.

The incident took place an hour after an Al Jazeera team tried to interview them, but their rooms had been cordoned off.

Islam had told reporters last week that he feared for his life after being taken from a friend’s house and tortured.

Deeply disturbed by reports from #Bangladesh that three leaders of the Students Against Discrimination movement have been forcibly taken from hospital by police. They were reportedly in hospital in the first place due to police torture. This madness must stop @BDPM_Geneva