BNP's Tarique Rahman faces arrest warrant

A court in Dhaka has issued arrest warrants against senior BNP leader Tarique Rahman and two others on charges of treason.

Prosecutor Tapash Kumar Pal said the court on Monday accepted the police chargesheet in the case, bdnews24 reported.

Police filed the case over ETV's live telecast of Tarique's speech at a programme in London on January 5, 2015.

Police filed the case three days later and pressed treason charges against Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) Senior Vice Chairman Tarique, then ETV chairman Abdus Salam, former chief reporter Mahathir Faruqi and former senior reporter Kanak Sarwar.

Salam is currently out on bail.

The court ordered the arrests of Faruqi and Sarwar on Monday and fixed November 20 for the indictment hearing.

According to police, the suspects threatened the country's sovereignty and tried to incite hatred against a legally constituted government by broadcasting and uttering false and fabricated information.

As per the case documents, the suspects had also tried to create a rift in the judiciary and internal conflicts within the Army, border guards and police.

--IANS

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