People living by the Kirtonkhola river in Barishal noticed in March this year that the river’s water had become unusually salty.

Although the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh is set to expire on May 31, no brand has yet agreed to re-sign the agreement.

Scientists have identified another new variant of novel coronavirus in the country with potentially worrying mutations.

The Czech government said yesterday it would slap a ceiling on the Russian embassy workforce as part of a spiralling diplomatic row, which means dozens of staff will have to leave by next month.

China yesterday said Australia’s sudden scrapping of a Belt and Road Initiative deal risked “serious harm” to relations and warned of retaliatory actions, but Canberra insisted it would not be bullied.

More than 1,700 people were detained by police at rallies in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny in dozens of cities across Russia, an independent monitor reported yesterday.

The BNP has sought an explanation from the party’s standing committee member Mirza Abbas over his statement on the disappearance of the party leader M Ilias Ali.

India yesterday posted a global record for the number of coronavirus cases in a day, as US President Joe Biden hailed his government’s “stunning” vaccination drive.

The ongoing Covid-19 crisis has been taking a heavy toll on low-income groups as they have been facing income losses and taking out loans to cope with the pandemic fallout.

Intelligence and regulatory bodies fear a possible labour unrest ahead of Eid caused by the uncertainty over payment of salaries and festival bonuses of workers of some factories affected by the pandemic.

The six-wheeled robot has converted some carbon dioxide from the Martian atmosphere into oxygen, the first time this has happened on another planet, the space agency said Wednesday.

Three Hefajat-e-Islam leaders were arrested in connection the cases filed over violence in 2013 and March this year, and four more, including three top Hefajat leaders, were placed on remand yesterday.

Indian authorities scrambled to shore up supplies of medical oxygen to hospitals in the capital, Delhi, yesterday as a fast-spreading second wave of coronavirus stretched medical infrastructure to breaking point, officials and doctors said.

Maulana Bhashani, president of the National Awami Party (NAP-Bhashani), said in a press statement that the examples of Chiang-ki-shek in China and Czar in Russia and British oppression in undivided India or zulum of Jalem Yazid at Karbala pale into insignificance before the latest example of atrocity perpetrated by Yahya’s army.

The European Commission yesterday announced tough draft rules on the use of artificial intelligence, including a ban on most surveillance, in an attempt to set global standards for a key technology dominated by China and the United States.

Germany’s defence ministry yesterday said it planned to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan in early July, after the United States announced plans to pull out by September 11.

Russian President Vladimir Putin called communist Cuba’s new leader Miguel Diaz-Canel Tuesday to discuss strengthening the two countries’ “strategic partnership,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a message retweeted by its embassy in Havana.

The Bangladesh High Commissioner to the UK Saida Muna Tasneem has briefed UK’s all-party parliamentary group (APPG) about the inconvenience caused by UK’s travel ban that has put Bangladesh among those nations on its “red list”.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday allocated Tk 10.50 crore for district deputy commissioners to provide assistance to the poor, distressed and insolvent people who were affected due to the ongoing lockdown.

Indonesia’s navy is searching for a missing submarine with 53 people on board that went missing yesterday and is seeking help from neighbouring Australia and Singapore in the hunt, the Indonesian military chief told Reuters.