Bangladesh cuts mobile internet as student protests over jobs intensify

Police fire tear gas at students in Dhaka who are demonstrating against civil service hiring rules they call discriminatory.

Bangladesh has suspended some mobile internet services, with police firing tear gas at student protesters as violent clashes over civil service hiring quotas continue to rock the country.

The nationwide protests, which have killed at least nine people and injured more than 500 this week, showed no signs of abating on Thursday, with authorities blocking mobile services across most of the South Asian country.

Zunaid Ahmed Palak, the junior information technology minister, said mobile internet had been “temporarily suspended” owing to “various rumours” and the “unstable situation created” on social media.

Services would be restored once the situation returned to normal, he added. Two days earlier, internet providers had cut off access to Facebook – the protesters’ key organising tool.

On Thursday morning, police fired tear gas canisters at students near BRAC University in the capital, Dhaka. Tear gas was also deployed against stone-throwing students who blocked a main highway in the southern port city of Chittagong.

“The situation is still volatile and restless,” said Al Jazeera’s Tanvir Chowdhury, reporting from Dhaka. “We know the protests are spreading in different parts of the city and … I’ve got reports of protests in other parts of the country.”

The unrest continued after students called for a nationwide shutdown on Wednesday evening, with the support of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), whose headquarters have been raided by police.

Shops and offices were open in Dhaka but there were fewer buses on the streets as the students’ shutdown call appeared to draw a limited