Author: Asian Bangla

The US State Department granted a visa to a man in Iran hoping to donate bone marrow to his US citizen brother with blood cancer, obtaining a rare waiver to President Donald Trump’s travel ban, the family’s lawyer said on Thursday. Mahsa Khanbabai, a lawyer based in Massachusetts, said she received a call on Thursday from the consulate in Yerevan, Armenia where Kamiar Hashemi had applied for a visa in February after he learned he was a rare 100 percent match for a transplant that could potentially save his brother’s life. The status of the visa application was “refused” on…

Hailstorm coupled with rain have damaged crops in the two northern districts of Lalmonirhat and Thakurgaon, and the adjoining areas. A number of houses along with trees were also damaged when the storm hit over hundreds of villages in the Upazilas on Friday morning. The storm began at 10am and ended around noon in the area, according to the locals. However, no casualties were reported. Chairman of Mogolhat union of Lalmonirhat’s Sadar Upazila Habibur Rahman said “big hailstones damaged roofs of many houses and flattened crops”.Shujol Rahman said, “I’ve never seen such a strong hailstorm in my life.” The local…

The government plans to change the English spellings of five districts to make them sound similar to the Bangla alphabet. The proposed spellings are Chattagram (for Chittagong), Barishal (for Barisal), Kumilla (for Comilla), Jashore (for Jessore) and Bagura (for Bogra). The suggestions will be placed at a meeting of the National Implementation Committee for Administrative Reorganisation-Reform or NICAR on Monday, said Cabinet Secretary Md Shafiul Alam. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will preside over the meeting at her office. NICAR works to reorganise districts, sub-districts, police stations, form new ministries, divisions, form and reform different administrative units with the prime minister…

A 9-year-old girl has died when a lift at a high-rise apartment building in Dhaka started moving up uncontrollably with the girl pinned inside the doors. The victim, Albira Rahman, lived in a flat on the 14th floor of the building, Green Peace, located at Shantinagar, with her parents Shiplu Rahman and Umme Salma Rahman. Dhaka Metropolitan Police Deputy Commissioner Md Anwar Hossain told Friday the tragedy occurred when the family were getting off the lift in front of their flat around 9:30pm on Thursday. The apartment building, Green Peace, in Dhaka’s Shantinagar. Screengrab of Somoy TV video. The apartment…

Britain on Wednesday announced plans for consumers to pay a deposit on plastic bottles as part of a broader push to tackle pollution. The government will introduce a charge on plastic, glass and metal single use drinks containers sold in England, the environment ministry said. The move is aimed at cutting the amount of waste produced in Britain-including an estimated 13 billion plastic drinks bottles annually. “It is absolutely vital we act now to tackle this threat and curb the millions of plastic bottles a day that go unrecycled,” said environment minister Michael Gove. “We want to take action on…

BPC logoBangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) will import 66,000 tonnes of high speed diesel (HSD) equivalent to 30 rakes from India’s Numaligarh Refinery Limited (NRL), The Economic Times reported. The import will take place from NRL’s Siliguri Marketing Terminal to Parbatipur Depot of Bangladesh Petroleum in Bangladesh between May to December, said the business daily said in a report published on Thursday. Titled “Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation to import 66,000 MT of high speed diesel from Numaligarh Refinery”, the report said the decision of the import was taken in a meeting between NRL and BPC in Shillong last week. BPC chairman Abu…

The United States is on track to meet the targets of the Paris climate agreement despite President Donald Trump’s plan to withdraw from the accord, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Thursday. Guterres said emissions-cutting plans put in motion by American businesses, regional governments and cities meant that the goals set by the former US administration which signed the deal in 2016 were within reach. “We have seen in the cities, and we have seen in many states, a very strong commitment to the Paris agreement, to the extent that some indicators are moving even better than in the recent past,”…

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow would expel 60 US diplomats and close Washington’s consulate in Saint Petersburg in a tit-for-tat response to the expulsion of its envoys across three continents. In Washington, the State Department said there was no justification for the Russian move and that the United States “reserves the right to respond.” “It’s clear from the list provided to us that the Russian Federation is not interested in a dialogue on issues that matter to our two countries,” spokeswoman Heather Nauert said of the expelled diplomats. “I want to remind you that there is no justification…

Hafizur Rahman and Dipto SarkarTwo more victims, Dipto Sarkar and Hafizur Rahman, of Mymensingh blast succumbed to their injuries at Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) on Friday, raising the death toll in the incident to four. Dipto and Hafizur also were students of Khulna University of Engineering and Technology (KUET). Dipto Sarkar, 22, from Magura, who was undergoing treatment at the burn unit of DMCH, succumbed to his injuries around 9:30am while Hafizur Rahman Hafiz, 24, from Naogaon died around 1:00am, DMCH police camp sub-inspector Bachchu Mia told Prothom Alo. Earlier Shahin, a final year student of KUET, succumbed to…

Participants at the internet expo.Exposed to abuse of children on the net, more than 80 per cent teenage internet users in Bangladesh feel they need stronger safety, says a UNICEF survey. About 20 per cent of the surveyed teenagers who are active on the social media, are subjected to harassment or abuse. In such a context, UNICEF, in collaboration with Facebook, on Friday launched a year-long campaign to raise awareness among children, teachers and parents and also increase their access to safe online content. More than 10,000 students from more than 100 schools, teachers, parents, policymakers, industry leaders, and…