28-02-2021

SUNDAY, FeBRUARY 28, 2021
11
KSRM Industrial Group sets up
Shaheed Minar in Purbachal
Local Government and Rural Development (LGRD) Minister Md Tajul Islam as the chief guest
addressed the inauguration ceremony of 'Patenga Boosting Pump Station' under Chittagong Water
Supply and Sanitation Project at Hotel Radisson Blu in Chattogram on Saturday. Photo: Courtesy
Brazil's capital goes into lockdown
to quell Covid-19 surge
The governor of Brazil's capital city,
Brasilia, decreed a 24-hour lockdown for all
but essential services on Friday to curb a
worsening Covid-19 outbreak that has filled
its intensive care wards to the brim, reports
BSS.
The drastic step came as right-wing
President Jair Bolsonaro, who has repeatedly
downplayed the gravity of the pandemic
that has killed 250,000 Brazilians,
renewed his attacks on state governors for
destroying jobs with lockdowns.
"The lockdown will start today and be
total, it will be 24-hours a day," said a press
aide for the federal district's Governor
Ibaneis Rocha. A decree published at the
end of the day said the lockdown would
start right after midnight Saturday.
Shops, pharmacies, gas stations, churches
and funeral parlors will remain open, the
aide said, but everything else will shut
down, especially bars and restaurants,
which were blamed for increased spread
during the end of last year and Carnival holidays.
Intensive care wards in Brasilia, the thirdlargest
city in Brazil with 3 million inhabitants,
are as full as they were at the peak of
the pandemic last year, with more than
80% of the beds occupied, the health
department said.
The situation is as bad or worse in cities
across Brazil, with intensive care beds in
the capitals of 17 of Brazil's 26 states this
week reaching the most critical level since
the pandemic began a year ago, according
to a report by biomedical center Fiocruz.
Bolsonaro, who lives and works in
Brasilia, said governors imposing restrictions
were doing Brazilians a disservice.
"What the people most want is to work,"
he said on a visit to northeastern Brazil on
Friday, one day after Brazil recorded its second-worst
daily death toll. He threatened to
cut off federal emergency pandemic assistance
to states resorting to lockdowns.
"From now on, governors who close down
their states will have to provide for their
own emergency aid," Bolsonaro said.
Brazil has had 65,169 new cases of the
novel coronavirus reported in the past 24
hours, and 1,337 deaths from Covid-19, the
health ministry said on Friday.
The South American country has now
registered 10,455,630 cases since the pandemic
began, while the official death toll
has risen to 252,835, according to ministry
data, in the world's third-worst outbreak
outside the United States and India and the
world's second-deadliest.
Hundreds of Nigerian schoolgirls
taken in mass abduction
Gunmen abducted 317 girls from a boarding
school in northern Nigeria on Friday, police
said, the latest in a series of mass kidnappings
of students in the West African nation,
reports UNB.
Police and the military have begun joint
operations to rescue the girls after the attack
at the Government Girls Junior Secondary
School in Jangebe town, according to a police
spokesman in Zamfara state, Mohammed
Shehu, who confirmed the number abducted.
One parent, Nasiru Abdullahi, told The
Associated Press that his daughters, aged 10
and 13, are among the missing.
"It is disappointing that even though the
military have a strong presence near the
school they were unable to protect the girls,"
he said. "At this stage, we are only hoping on
divine intervention."
Resident Musa Mustapha said the gunmen
also attacked a nearby military camp and
checkpoint, preventing soldiers from interfering
while the gunmen spent several hours
at the school. It was not immediately clear if
there were any casualties.
Several large groups of armed men operate
in Zamfara state, described by the government
as bandits, and are known to kidnap for
money and to push for the release of their
members from jail.
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari
said Friday the government's primary objective
is to get all the school hostages returned
safe, alive and unharmed.
"We will not succumb to blackmail by bandits
and criminals who target innocent school
students in the expectation of huge ransom
payments," he said. "Let bandits, kidnappers
and terrorists not entertain any illusions that
they are more powerful than the government.
They shouldn't mistake our restraint for the
humanitarian goals of protecting innocent
lives as a weakness, or a sign of fear or irresolution."
He called on state governments to review
their policy of making payments, in money or
vehicles, to bandits.
"Such a policy has the potential to backfire
with disastrous consequences," Buhari said.
He also said state and local governments
must play their part by being proactive in
improving security in and around schools.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres
strongly condemned the abductions and
called for the girls' "immediate and unconditional
release" and safe return to their families,
calling attacks on schools a grave violation
of human rights and the rights of children,
U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric
said.
South Korea allows
workers to squeeze
extra doses
South Korea's Disease
Control and Prevention
Agency has allowed health
workers to squeeze extra
doses from vials of coronavirus
vaccines developed by
AstraZeneca and Pfizer,
reports UNB.
The decision on Saturday
came after some health
workers who were administering
the AstraZeneca shots
reported to authorities that
they still saw additional
doses left in the bottles that
had each been used for 10
injections.
KDCA official Jeong
Gyeong-shil said skilled
workers may be able to
squeeze one or two extra
doses from each vial if they
use low dead-volume
syringes designed to reduce
wasted medications and vaccines.
However, she said the
KDCA isn't allowing health
workers from combining
vaccines left in different bottles
to create more doses.
Russian diplomats arrive
from virus-hit North
Korea on rail trolley
SEOUL : Eight Russian
diplomats and family members
- the youngest of them
a three-year-old girl - have
arrived home from North
Korea on a hand-pushed
rail trolley due to
Pyongyang's coronavirus
restrictions.
Video posted on Russia's
foreign ministry's verified
Telegram account showed
the trolley, laden with suitcases
and women, being
pushed across a border railway
bridge by Third
Secretary Vladislav
Sorokin, the only man in
the group.
They waved and cheered
as they approached their
homeland, the culmination
of an expedition that began
with a 32-hour train trip
from Pyongyang, followed
by a two-hour bus ride to
the border.
"It took a long and difficult
journey to get home,"
the ministry said in the post
late Thursday, speaking of
the final stretch.
The prize distribution of the final game of the Inter-Upazila Football League was held at Mohadevpur
in Naogaonon Friday evening.
Photo: M Shakhawath Hossain
SM Akash, Chattogram
Correspondent: A Shaheed Minarhas
been constructed in Sector 11 of
Purbachal New Town in the capital
with the funding of KSRM, a wellknown
steel manufacturer in the country.
This is the first Shaheed Minar in
Purbachal built at Joy Bangla Chattar.
It was built with the approval of
RAJUK at the initiative of Ikrimikari, a
children's publishing house. The
Shaheed Minar was designed by artist
Mahbubul Haque. According to the
entrepreneurs, a cultural zone will be
built around the Shaheed Minar in the
new city of Purbachal. Which will
spread the message of Bengali and
Bengali culture and tradition to the new
generation.
Built of steel sheet, this Shaheed
Minar has four pillars. The nozzles of
the two pillars will be connected with
the other two. As such, one of the two
pillars is 21 feet high and the other is 31
feet high. On the altar of the minaret
there will be a beautiful and beautiful
flower garden. There is still some work
to be done. However, it has been open
to the public since February 21. On the
morning of Ekushey, people of different
professions paid homage to the language
martyrs by placing flowers on the
altar of Shaheed Minar.
The Shaheed Minar was inaugurated
on 20 February around Joy Bangla
Chattar by drawing the alphabet and
alpana of artists, children and local
people.
It was inaugurated by language soldier
Ahmed Rafiq. Local MP Gazi
Golam Dastagir and Bir Pratik were
also present at the inaugural function.
In this context, KSRM Deputy
Managing Director Shahriar Jahan
Rahat said, 21 means Bangla. February
is language month. And Ekushey
February is the passion of Bangla and
Bengali. Which is mixed in the blood
stream of generation after generation.
In the month of language, KSRM wants
to be associated with that passion of the
nation from the side of Ikrimikri, the
entrepreneurial organization for the
construction of Shaheed Minar. The
memory of the heroes who gave their
lives for the language is further enlightened
by the construction of Shaheed
Minar. We want the heroism of the
martyrs to be more meaningful and
meaningful to the new generation.
Besides, humble homage to those
heroes whose self-sacrifice has made
the mother tongue Bangla the seat of
dignity.
Regarding KSRM's involvement in
the construction of Shaheed Minar in
Purbachal, Media Advisor Mizanul
Islam said, "KSRM has stood by the
entrepreneurs respecting the sacrifices
of Bahasa Shahid." The urge of KSRM
to preserve the memory of those who
sacrificed their lives for the protection
of the mother tongue will be remembered
with gratitude by generation
after generation.
Kakli, executive editor of Ikrimikori,
an entrepreneurial children's publishing
house, said about the main event, to
cherish the beloved alphabet acquired
at the cost of one's life; One of the ways
to pay homage to the martyrs. And for
that purpose, the Shaheed Minar has
been built at the Joy Bangla Chattar in
Purbachal with the love of KSRM and
people of all walks of life. Alphabet festival
will be organized regularly in this
Shaheed Minar every year with the participation
of all. It will be universal. We
want to build a cultural zone around
this Shaheed Minar in the new town of
Purbachal. Where Bengali language
and Bengali nationalism will be practiced.
A Shaheed Minar has been constructed in Sector 11 of Purbachal New Town in the capital with the
funding of KSRM.
Photo: S M Akash
Myanmar police deploy early to
crank up pressure on protests
Police in Myanmar on Saturday escalated
their crackdown on demonstrators
against this month's military
takeover, deploying early and in force
as protesters sought to assemble in the
country's two biggest cities, reports
UNB.
Myanmar's crisis took a dramatic
turn Friday on the international stage
when the country's ambassador to the
United Nations at a special session of
the General Assembly declared his loyalty
to the ousted civilian government
of Aung San Suu Kyi and called on the
world to pressure the military to cede
power.
There were arrests in Yangon and
Mandalay, the two biggest cities where
demonstrators have been hitting the
streets daily to peacefully demand the
restoration of the government of Suu
Kyi, whose National League for
Democracy party won a landslide election
victory in November. Police have
increasingly been enforcing an order
by the junta banning gatherings of five
or more people.
Many other cities and towns have
also hosted large protests against the
Feb. 1 coup.
The takeover has reversed years of
slow progress toward democracy after
five decades of military rule. Suu Kyi's
party would have been installed for a
second five-year term in office, but the
army blocked Parliament from convening
and detained her and President
Win Myint and other top members of
her government.
At the General Assembly in New
York, Myanmar's Ambassador Kyaw
Moe Tun declared in an emotional
speech to fellow delegates that he represented
Suu Kyi's "civilian government
elected by the people" and supported
the fight against military rule.
He urged all countries to issue public
statements strongly condemning the
coup, and to refuse to recognize the
military regime. He also called for
stronger international measures to
stop violence by security forces against
peaceful demonstrators.
He drew loud applause from many
diplomats in the 193-nation global
body, as well as effusive praise from
other Burmese on social media, who
described him as a hero. The ambassador
flashed a three-finger salute that
has been adopted by the civil disobedience
movement at the end of his speech
in which he addressed people back
home in Burmese.
In Yangon on Saturday morning,
police began arrests early at the
Hledan Center intersection, which has
become the gathering point for protesters
who then fan out to other parts of
the city. Police took similar action in
residential neighborhoods.
Security forces also tried to thwart
protests in Mandalay, where roadblocks
were set up at several key intersections
and the regular venues for rallies
were flooded with police.
Mandalay has been the scene of several
violent confrontations, and at least
four of eight confirmed deaths linked
to the protests, according to the independent
Assistance Association of
Political Prisoners.
On Friday, at least three people there
were injured, two of whom were shot in
the chest by rubber bullets and another
who suffered what appeared to be a
bullet wound on his leg.
According to the association, 771 people
have been arrested, charged or sentenced
at one point in relation to the
coup, and 689 are being detained or
sought for arrest.
The junta said it took power because
last year's polls were marred by massive
irregularities. The election commission
before the military seized
power coup had refuted the allegation
of widespread fraud. The junta dismissed
the old commission's members
and appointed new ones, who on
Friday annulled the election results.
Philippines extends
partial coronavirus
curbs in Manila until
March
Philippine President Rodrigo
Duterte has extended partial
coronavirus curbs in the capital
until the end of March, as
the country awaits the arrival
of vaccines, the presidential
spokesman said on Saturday
(Feb 27), reports BSS.
With South-east Asia's second-highest
tally of infections
and deaths, the Philippines
has suffered lengthy, strict
lockdowns in Manila and
provinces, hitting an economy
that was among Asia's
fastest growing before the
pandemic.
Curbs will stay for another
month in Manila, which
accounts for 40 per cent of
national economic output, the
spokesman Harry Roque said
in a statement.
Also under partial curbs are
Mr Duterte's southern home
city of Davao, and the northern
city of Baguio.
The curbs limit operations
of businesses and public
transport.
The decision follows a
report of 2,651 new virus
infections, the highest daily
increase in more than four
months.Despite calls to further
re-open the economy, the
firebrand leader has pledged
to maintain curbs in the virus
epicentre of Manila until
mass vaccinations begin.
The Philippines will be the
last regional nation to get its
first shipment of vaccines,
comprising 600,000 doses of
Sinovac Biotech's vaccines
donated by China, to be delivered
on Sunday, and earmarked
for healthcare workers
and troops.