About 80 people were injured in clashes between rival groups in Bangladesh on Tuesday as protesters blocked transport for the third day to try to force the removal of controversial election officials.
Police fired teargas to disperse stone-throwing and stick wielding political activists in Mymensingh, 130 km (80 miles) from the capital Dhaka. About 50 people were injured. Others were hurt in clashes in Dhaka and Cox's Bazar in the south-east, where protesters used hand-made bombs, sticks and stones.
Crowds had attacked vehicles and stopped trains across Bangladesh earlier on Tuesday to enforce the transport blockade, intended to force the removal of the election officials before polls in January.
Ports remained closed and businesses called for urgent action to end the blockade as the shipment of most goods ground to a halt in the country of 140 million people.
"We cannot leave the roads or let the transport move again until they fulfil our conditions," said Abdul Jalil, the general secretary of the Awami League. Two people were and more than 100 injured in clashes with police in the previous two days.
On Tuesday, hundreds of protesters, who are mainly drawn from a 14-party alliance led by former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, stoned vehicles in towns in northern and eastern Bangladesh. "Never before have we seen such a crippling situation," said Mohammad Rouf, a businessman stranded in Dhaka since the blockade began on Sunday.
Police said there were no reports of casualties on Tuesday. Hasina and her Awami League-led alliance says chief election commissioner M.A. Aziz and his deputies are sympathetic towards the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) of Begum Khaleda Zia, who ended her five-year term as prime minister last month.
The BNP has rejected the charges and the interim administration of President Iajuddin Ahmed has made no public comment on the demand for the removal of the election officials. Bangladesh has being run by an interim administration headed by the president since Khaleda Zia stepped down. The use of an interim government is dictated by the constitution and is designed to ensure free and fair elections.
During her term, Khaleda faced dozens of strikes and violent protests called by Hasina and the Awami League intended to topple the prime minister and her then-ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party. The BNP has started holding rallies of its own across the country, worsening the crisis.
Business leaders met the president on Tuesday and asked him to "act boldly and neutrally to save the country from ongoing political crisis". "We have told the president that he need not be worried over who will be happy or unhappy by his actions," Mir Nasir Hossain, president of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry, told reporters.
Aziz has said he will not quit even if asked to do so by the interim government. The Bangladesh Shop Owners Association told reporters it would stop selling goods and services to Aziz until he vacated his post. The country's two sea ports remained shut, officials said. "I have been without work for two days with my family starving," said three-wheeler cab driver Abdul Baset as he took out his vehicle in Dhaka on Tuesday to look for customers.
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