Author: Asian Bangla

Asianbangla, Dhaka : A battle is under way to force the global shipping industry to play its part in tackling climate change. A meeting of the International Maritime Organisation in London next week will face demands for shipping to radically reduce its CO2 emissions. If shipping doesn’t clean up, it could contribute almost a fifth of the global total of CO2 by 2050. A group of nations led by Brazil, Saudi Arabia, India, Panama and Argentina is resisting CO2 targets for shipping. Their submission to the meeting says capping ships’ overall emissions would restrict world trade. It might also…

Citing concern over the health of Khaleda Zia, the BNP has demanded her unconditional release from jail. Related Stories “We are anxious over her health. We urge the government to release her immediately so that we can arrange necessary medical tests and treatments by her personal physicians,” BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said at a media briefing in Dhaka on Friday. When asked if the former prime minister would be taken abroad if released, Fakhrul said: “We just want an unconditional release for her so that we can arrange medical care for her, either in the country or…

The World Bank is helping Bangladesh overcome barriers to higher growth. Unreliable power supply and environmentally-unstainable enterprises hinder a county’s competitiveness and poverty reduction efforts,” Zahid Hussain, World Bank’s acting country director for Bangladesh, said in a statement on Friday. “By improving electricity transmission and helping in micro-enterprises adopt environment-friendly technologies, these projects will help Bangladesh achieve sustainable growth and advance towards upper middle-income country vision.” The $450 million Enhancement and Strengthening of Power Transmission Network in Eastern Region Project will expand the electricity transmission network in the eastern region, covering Comilla and Noakhali and part of Chittagong. It will…

Nervous stock investors are hoping an unusually US strong earnings season can restore some of the optimism that characterised equity markets last year. Imploding technology stocks and fears of a trade war have pummeled the market in recent days. Given the surge in volatility this year, there is no guarantee that worst is over. Analysts predict strong results when reporting season starts up next month, with first-quarter S&P 500 profit growth on track to be the highest in seven years, according to Thomson Reuters data. That follows a blockbuster fourth-quarter period, and recent corporate tax cuts that boosted forecasts for…

The heist of $81 million from the Bangladesh central bank’s account at the New York Federal Reserve last year was “state-sponsored,” an FBI officer in the Philippines, who has been involved in the investigations, said on Wednesday. Lamont Siller, the legal attache at the US embassy, did not elaborate but his comments in a speech in Manila are a strong signal that authorities in the United States are close to naming who carried out one of the world’s biggest cyber heists. Last week, officials in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity, blamed North Korea. “We all know the Bangladesh Bank…

Police recovered sliced body parts of a man from the Buriganga River in Keraniganj upazila of Dhaka on Friday night. The body parts were found in a sack floating in the river. Local people spotted the sack floating in the river in Kholamora Gazirghat area of the upazila around 7:00pm and informed police, said Keraniganj model police station sub-inspector Mansur Ali. Later, a team of police retrieved two legs and two hands of a man’s body wrapped with polythene, reports UNB. Mansur said they sent the sliced body parts to Sir Salimullah Medical College Hospital morgue for autopsy.

The Dhaka-Chittagong highway witnessed 42-kilometre long tailback on Saturday due to heavy pressure of vehicles, causing sufferings to thousands of commuters. Several hundred vehicles were stuck on both sides on the busy highway stretching from Madanpur of Narayanganj to Daudkandi upazila of Comilla. Vehicles ply through the four-lane highway have to cross two-lane Daudkandi, Meghna and Kanchpur bridges that slows down speed of vehicles on the highway, an official of  highway police said. Shoyeb, a banker, said he started journey for Dhaka from Chittagong at 2:00 am. He reached Daudkandi Toll plaza when it was 11:18 am. “Usually I cross…

Awami League general secretary and road, transport and bridges minister Obaidul Quader today alleged that the Bangladesh Nationalist Party leaders were resorting to falsehood regarding the health condition of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson Khaleda Zia. ‘The civil surgeon has already visited Begum Zia in jail… A medical board will be formed and she will be sent abroad if the board suggests,’ he said after visiting the development work of Baipal-Abdullhapur highway at Zirabo in Ashulia. Quader said that the government would do everything for the proper treatment of Khaleza Zia after taking doctors’ advice. ‘If the doctors suggest the…

US president Donald Trump insisted Thursday that US forces would pull out of Syria ‘very soon’ and lamented what he said was Washington’s waste of $7 trillion in Middle East wars. In a populist address to industrial workers in Ohio, Trump said US forces were close to securing all of the territory that the Islamic State jihadist group once claimed. ‘We’ll be coming out of Syria, like, very soon. Let the other people take care of it now,’ he promised, to applause. Trump did not say who the others were who might take care of Syria, but Russia and Iran…

In a broad expansion of the information gathered from applicants for US visas, the federal government is proposing to collect social media identities from nearly everyone who seeks entry into the United States, according to a State Department filing on Friday. The proposal, if approved by the Office of Management and Budget, would require most immigrant and non-immigrant visa applicants to list all social media identities they have used in the past five years. The information will be used to vet and identify them, according to the proposals, which would affect about 14.7 million people annually. The proposals support president…