pass the roti on the left hand side

 Thousands of indigenous people were left homeless as their shanty houses were burnt to ashes on February 19th and 20th. In the attacks, committed by members of the majority Bengali speaking population in the presence of law enforcers, two people including a woman were killed and more than 50 injured, while 357 houses were set ablaze across 11 villages.

 I don't know Bangladeshi political history well enough to evaluate the arguments, but as a primer on Bangladesh, it's well written, readable, and worth taking a glance at.  The news hook is that the Bangladeshi Supreme Court recently upheld a 5-year-old decision banning the use of religion in politics.

Additionally, I've been meaning to put a plug in for the source, Newsline, which is among the best publications I've seen out of Pakistan - if not South Asia - in a while.   Take a browse around.

In my Google News, I caught today that a Bangladeshi Internet publication is reporting that there are 50,000 cases of swine flu that have developed in the last few weeks.   There is just one major problem with this story.  As far as I can tell, we don't actually know if Bangladesh has been hit by 50,000 cases of swine flu in recent weeks based on the reporting:

Below I provide an excerpt from the letter:

The army of Bangladesh is reportedly leaving the CHT, only 12 years after the conclusion of a peace deal with an insurgent group: 

Bangladesh on Monday evacuated hundreds of thousands of people to emergency shelters on the southwestern coast as a cyclone hit the country, as well as neighbouring India, officials said.

Government weather forecaster Sanaul Haq said Cyclone Aila made landfall between Bangladesh's Khulna district and Sagar Island in India's West Bengal state, unleashing a tidal surge as high as two metres (seven feet).

Published apology in the Daily Star.  Those of us who have national allegiances could take notes on this:

We reject the Pakistani state and army's claim that these atrocities were committed in our name.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's three-month old government has appointed a former bureaucrat as the new chief of the independent Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) nearly a month after resignation of former army chief Hassan Mashhud Chowdhury.

A government statement last night announced appointment of former secretary to the government Ghulam Rahman, currently serving as the chairman of Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission.

The government also downgraded the status of the ACC chairman to a Supreme Court judge from the status of a minister, which was being enjoyed by General Chowdhury.

Bangladesh has decided not to make fresh recruitment against the 10 per cent vacant posts in government sector to curtail public spending in view of the global recession.

"The government takes the decision on jobs cut prompted by the logic of saving the public resources," Finance Minister AMA Muhith said at a function yesterday, a day after a government circular disclosed the plan.