A protester was killed as security forces and Bangladesh's largest Islamist party men fought street battles in capital Dhaka on Wednesday morning in the second day of a nationwide general strike, with dozens including policemen and journalists injured.
"Khalilur Rahman, president of a ward unit of Islami Chhatra Shibir (the student wing of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami party) died in a city hospital where he was rushed with head injuries," Mohammad Rafiqul Islam, officer-in-charge of Dhaka's Jatrabari police station, told Xinhua.
He said Rahman, 20, was hit by a vehicle as he ran to flee a scene being chased by police during the clashes, where dozens of shots were fired by law enforcers.
The official could not tell immediately whether the Shibir leader suffered bullet injuries.
He said at least three policemen were injured in the clashes which erupted at about 7: p.m local time. "We've come to know that a few journalists were also injured."
According to police, dozens of Shibir men brought out a procession and started to vandalize vehicles in Jatrabari, the gateway to the capital city from the north and southwestern regions of the South Asian country .
At one stage, police chased the pro-hartal activists when they fought running battles with the law enforcers, he said, adding that Shibir men hurled crude bombs and brickbats at the law enforcers while fleeing.
Shibir spokesman was not immediately available for comment.
On Tuesday, Jamaat men exploded crude bombs, blocked roads and burned vehicles to enforce the 48-hour nationwide general strike, injuring dozens of people including policemen.
Jamaat enforced the nationwide 48-hour non-stop hartal from Tuesday morning, protesting what it referred to as "the government hatching conspiracy to annihilate the party."
Jamaat called the hartal hours after a High Court Division bench of Bangladesh on Aug. 1 declared illegal Bangladesh Jamaat-e- Islami's registration as a political party with the Election Commission.
The High Court bench handed down the verdict after a petition was filed in 2009, calling for the party's registration to be cancelled. The petition said Jamaat was a religion-based political party and it did not believe in the independence and sovereignty of Bangladesh.
Defence lawyer Abdur Razzaq, also a Jamaat assistant secretary general, said no clause of his party was in "conflict" with the Bangladeshi Constitution.
The verdict came amid growing demand for outlawing Jamaat, which was blamed for war crimes during the country's Liberation War in 1971. The cancellation of registration means it cannot take part in the forthcoming parliamentary elections slated for early 2014.
After returning to power in January 2009, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, daughter of Bangladesh's independence hero Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, established the first tribunal in March 2010, almost 40 years after the 1971 fight for independence from Pakistan, to castigate those committing crimes against humanity during the nine- month war.
Jamaat's five current and former leaders have already been sentenced to either death or life imprisonment for crimes against humanity linked to the country's war of independence.
Apart from several other Jamaat high ups, two leaders of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) are also standing trial on charges of crimes against humanity.
Both BNP and Jamaat, which dismissed the tribunals as a government "show trial" without the oversight or involvement of the United Nations, has been waging protests.
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