00:00Obviously, we've heard most of what has happened, but what has happened is that there was a
00:05sequence of events.
00:07It was a minor protest, and it wasn't even against really a decision of our government.
00:11The quota was not made by our government.
00:14Our government had actually removed the quota many, two, three years ago.
00:20But the families of the freedom fighters went to court.
00:24The court reinstated the quota, and that's why we had the protest.
00:28But I think all along, other vested groups, some other vested groups, kept inciting this
00:35protest.
00:36We accepted the protesters' demands.
00:38We wanted a peaceful resolution.
00:42Even when the violence happened, we formed a judicial committee to investigate, and we
00:49suspended police officers.
00:51But I think there was some group that kept inciting the protesters, and ultimately it
00:57turned violent, and it became an issue of my mother's safety.
01:02The protesters were marching on the prime minister's residence.
01:06My mother did not want to leave the country.
01:09She, even at the last minute when she went to the military airbase and she told her sister
01:17to get on the helicopter, my aunt put me in touch, called me and put me in touch and said,
01:25your mom doesn't want to leave.
01:27And I talked to her and I convinced her that you have to leave because they will kill you.
01:33She did not wish to leave Bangladesh.
01:37So this is the situation.
01:38I think this situation was escalated deliberately on July 15th.
01:45First of all, there was no reason for the protest because it was not a decision of our
01:49government.
01:50It was a decision of the courts.
01:51And our government was actually appealing against the court decision.
01:55So if they had just waited for the court decision, the quota would have been ruled.
02:01Secondly, first, the protests were peaceful.
02:05Our police were guarding the protesters.
02:08Because it was peaceful, on the night of 15th of July, someone started marching, some group
02:15started marching at Dhaka University in the middle of the night, in darkness, chanting
02:19we are Rajakar, we are Rajakar, which is, they took one of my mother's statements out
02:24of context.
02:25My mother said, we don't want Rajakar's families to get government jobs.
02:31That is what she said.
02:33But these, whoever was instigating turned it into saying that my mother called the student
02:39protesters Rajakar.
02:40She did not say that at all.
02:44And chanting we are Rajakar in the middle of the night at Dhaka University is like chanting
02:52in Jerusalem in the middle of the night, we are Nazis, we are Nazis.
02:56What would, what do you think would be the reaction of the people of Jerusalem?
03:00And so that's what happened.
03:02All our pro-Awama League students, they got angry.
03:06They attacked the protesters.
03:08They got into a fight with them.
03:10The police tried to stop the fight and in trying to stop the fight, some of the police
03:14officers used excessive force.
03:18Our government immediately suspended those police officers.
03:21Our government formed a three-member judicial committee to investigate the deaths.
03:27But I think that whole incident was designed to set up so that then they could claim these
03:33protesters to be martyrs and escalate the situation to demand the resignation of the
03:38government.
03:39And that is what has happened.
03:40And I think that there are outside forces here, inside forces.
03:45Many of the protesters were armed with firearms.
03:47They attacked police stations with guns.
03:50Why did the protesters have guns?
03:53Where did those guns come from?
