Police detained more than 3,000 people and broke up rallies in Moscow and across Russia yesterday as supporters of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny braved the bitter cold and a massive show of police force to demand he be set free.

Two men were arrested yesterday on charges of raping a third grader and a 12-year-old girl in Narayanganj and Moulvibazar.

The health authorities in Bangladesh recorded 16 more coronavirus-related deaths and 369 new cases in the last 24 hours till 8:00am yesterday.

Cold wave continues to sweep through the country’s northern region with the low-income people passing their days in hardship.

WHO experts yesterday visited the market in central China linked to the first known Covid-19 cluster, seeking clues about the beginning of the pandemic as a number of nations further tightened restrictions to stop the coronavirus.

Almost a dozen lawmakers are involved in money laundering, human trafficking, and property grabbing, and other forms of corruption, BNP MP Gulam Mohammad Siraj told parliament yesterday.

A physically challenged teenager was raped in a moving train allegedly by a staff of Bangladesh Railways in Moulvibazar’s Srimangal upazila Friday night.

A one-off tax on Argentina’s richest people to help pay for medical supplies and relief for small businesses battered by the global coronavirus pandemic entered into force on Friday.

The health authorities confirmed 17 more new coronavirus-related deaths and 363 new cases in 24 hours till 8:00am yesterday.

Elections to 62 municipalities in 36 districts ended yesterday amid reports of clashes, stuffing of ballot boxes and driving polling agents out of voting centres.

Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen yesterday said the conviction of lawmaker Mohammad Shahid Islam alias Kazi Papul is a matter of sadness and shame for the country.

The United Arab Emirates, accused this week by the United States of military intervention in Libya’s protracted civil war, issued a statement Friday stating its readiness to work “closely” with the new US administration for a peaceful solution to the conflict.

The brother and aides of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny were placed under house arrest on Friday ahead of new rallies, as Russian authorities warned that protesters could face charges of taking part in “mass unrest”.

The US Capitol police officer who died after being injured in the January 6 attack by pro-Trump rioters will lie in honor at the building’s Rotunda, lawmakers said Friday, a mark of respect rarely bestowed.

A car bomb in the Turkish-controlled region of Afrin in northern Syria yesterday killed five people including a child, a British-based war monitor said.

Rich countries squabbling over Covid-19 vaccine supplies must consider the situation in poorer parts of the world, WHO said, as the EU backtracked on a threat to restrict exports of shots to Northern Ireland in its growing row with Britain.

Jeshore-6 MP Shaheen Chaklader is facing criticisms after a leaked phone conversation revealed that he asked a police officer to bomb a police station and frame a lawyer for it.

India blocked mobile internet services in several areas around New Delhi yesterday as protesting farmers began a one-day hunger strike after a week of clashes with authorities that left one dead and hundreds injured.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi may visit Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s memorial in Tungipara during his visit to Bangladesh in March if a proposal under discussion fructifies, diplomatic sources in New Delhi said yesterday.

Shafika and Jhunjhuni are inseparable. Fondly named after Shafika’s favourite toy from when she was a toddler, the Black Bengal follows Shafika everywhere.