Bangladesh police release student leaders after unrest

DHAKA: Bangladesh police freed six student leaders on Thursday whose campaign against civil service job quotas sparked deadly nationwide unrest, as the government looked to calm tensions and forestall fresh demonstrations.

Students Against Discrimination staged nationwide rallies last month that ended in a police crackdown and the deaths of at least 206 people, according to an AFP count of police and hospital data.

The group´s leadership were among thousands picked up in the police dragnet that followed some of the worst unrest of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina´s 15-year tenure.

“All six quota movement coordinators have been returned to their families this afternoon,” deputy commissioner Junaed Alam Sarkar said.

Principal leader Nahid Islam and two others were forcibly discharged from a hospital in the capital Dhaka last Friday by plainclothes detectives and taken to an unknown location.

His father Badrul Islam confirmed to AFP that Nahid Islam had returned home early on Thursday afternoon but did not give any more details.