The shipbreaking industry implies an industry that processes (e.g., separates and stores) old and discarded steel, copper metal materials, serviceable parts and machineries, fittings, furniture, and other materials in a shipyard or any convenient place. Importing and dismantling ships can generate foreign exchange revenue for the home country and potentially boost economic growth. Bangladesh is making a significant contribution to the global shipbreaking market through resource recovery.

The heinous tragedy and torment of Gaza continues unabated. The outrage of international public opinion, overwhelming support of states in the UN General Assembly, unprecedented Security Council binding resolution, and the Secretary-General’s repeated warning of an apocalyptic situation warranting immediate cease-fire and uninterrupted access of humanitarian assistance have so far gone unheeded in this world order.

'We are truly prisoners of the mind', says Sanya Rushdi, the author-narrator of Hospital (Giramondo Publishing, 2023)

A big believer in social exchanges and developing safe spaces to position art as a medium of healing in community, Thami works on ceremonial interventions, performances, drawings, zine-making, fly posting, and public intervention, brought together by participant involvement

This year, to celebrate Sister Library Dhaka turning four, we acquired a collection of 100 zines curated by the library’s founder, Aqui Thami. The collection will be available for reading at the Goethe-Institut library from June onwards. With the acquisition of this collection, we are finally connected to the mothership Sister Library in Bombay.

There is something in the tactility of books that even non-readers find themselves admiring, and readers more so.

The Road Safety Foundation (RSF) reports that almost 6524 lives have been lost by accident in 2023. Along with deaths, several people are also left severely injured by such accidents.

Lead is a toxic, non-biodegradable chemical element that mostly exists in ore form. Alhough it is a natural element of our environment, due to anthropogenic reasons such as combustion of gasoline, burning of coal, mining, smelting, using lead-based paints and batteries— the level of lead exposure has risen to an alarming level.

The Three-Body Problem is the first book in the Remembrance of Earth’s Past (2006) trilogy by Cixin Liu, a renowned Chinese author.

As long-awaited summer showers arrive to offer respite from the sweltering heat we have been experiencing, here are a few books to accompany you as you cosy up in bed and watch the rain beat down on your windows.

I recently had the sublime experience of watching the recent adaptation of Frank Herbert’s Dune (Chilton Books, 1965), a 2021 and 2023 two-part movie series directed by the passionate Denis Villeneuve. It is, in my mind, a cinematic triumph, and I am thrilled to witness the surge interest these movies have driven for Herbert’s science fiction book series of the same name.

In 2015, a 15-year-old British citizen Shamima Begum travelled to Syria to join the ISIS. In 2019, the Home Secretary of the United Kingdom (UK) decided to revoke Shamima Begum’s British citizenship on the presumption of her Bangladeshi citizenship, a claim which the government of Bangladesh contradicts.

The law schools one sees in Hollywood movies and law schools in Bangladesh have tons of dissimilarities.

Anisul Hoque’s Kokhono Amar Maa-ke is the story of appalling sacrifices made by a mother and her unwavering determination to secure a bright future for her children.

Inevitably, Kaiser Haq’s The New Frontier and Other Odds and Ends in Verse and Prose is about the poet, his poetic predilections, and situatedness at this time of human existence. In many ways it is typical of the verse we have come to expect from our leading poet in English for a long time now, but in other ways it articulates his present-day concerns in new and striking poetic measures. 

This week Your Advocate is Barrister Omar Khan Joy, Advocate, Supreme Court of Bangladesh. He is the head of the chambers of a renowned law firm, namely, 'Legal Counsel', which has expertise mainly in commercial law, family law, labour law, land law, constitutional law, criminal law, and IPR.

Following months of deliberation, the UN Security Council successfully adopted a resolution on 25 March 2024 calling for an “immediate ceasefire for the month of Ramadan” and emphasising the urgent need for increased humanitarian aid to enter Gaza. In practical terms, this resolution, in accordance with international law, is legally binding on all UN member states, including Israel and Palestine, the latter holding observer status.

The UN Refugee Convention 1951 was crafted to support the refugees legally and morally. Many European states benefitted from the convention after World War II. However, it is a matter of irony that many of these same states are in favour of close borders now, whenever people are seeking refuge as the victims of war, ethnic cleansing, political or communal clashes, etc.

Articles on Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s last novel to be published by his sons against the author’s wishes built up my anticipation and I couldn’t wait for April to arrive. Thanks to Bookworm, I got my copy the moment they had it in store and I read it twice. It didn’t impress me the first time as it was just a string of chapters describing how a promiscuous woman drove herself into the arms of different men on her annual August 16 visits to a Caribbean island.

Priyanka Taslim greets me with a gentle smile as we meet over Zoom. She is eloquent and our conversation flows organically, akin to an adda over a cup of saa (cha).