DHAKA: Paramilitary forces were deployed in industrial suburbs around the Bangladesh capital as protests by garment sector workers demanding a wage hike stretched into their fourth day on Tuesday, defying calls to return to factories.<\/p>\n
Protesters are still on the streets despite the government\u2019s announcement of a board to review the minimum wage in the vital garment industry, which employs millions of people and generates the bulk of Bangladesh\u2019s export earnings.<\/p>\n
The South Asian nation of 170 million people is the world\u2019s second-biggest garment exporter behind China, producing clothes for major international brands.<\/p>\n
Police have filed cases against thousands of unidentified protesters for torching police vehicles and damaging property, with 58 officers injured since protests began, police spokesperson Kamarum Munira said.<\/p>\n
Workers said scores of protesters have also been injured, with demonstrators seen hurling bricks at police who in turn used batons and fired tear gas to disperse the crowds.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome factories are closed and workers have taken to the streets,\u201d Home Minister Salahuddin Ahmed said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome miscreants are trying to incite violence and make the situation more complicated.\u201d<\/p>\n
The paramilitary Border Guard Bangladesh force said it had deployed forces in Gazipur and Narayanganj, key industrial suburbs around Dhaka, and were using drones to monitor the unrest.<\/p>\n
The garment industry generates around four-fifths of Bangladesh\u2019s export earnings, worth up to $38 billion, and employs more than four million people.<\/p>\n
Workers say the rising cost of food, housing, transport and health care has eroded their purchasing power in a country with eight percent inflation.<\/p>\n
They are demanding a minimum monthly wage of 30,000 taka ($245) \u2014 a 140 percent increase from the current 12,500 taka.<\/p>\n
Industry representatives said on Monday workers from at least 670 factories had walked out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DHAKA: Paramilitary forces were deployed in industrial suburbs around the Bangladesh capital as protests by garment sector workers demanding a wage hike stretched into their fourth day on Tuesday, defying calls to return to factories. Protesters are still on the streets despite the government\u2019s announcement of a board to review the minimum wage in the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":105297,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105284"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105284\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105298,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105284\/revisions\/105298"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}