Bangladesh's fastest man, the UK-based Bangladesh-origin sprinter Imranur Rahman on Sunday evening ceremonially received the country' s historic gold medal, first ever at Asian level from the men's 60-meter sprint of the 10th Asian Indoor Athletics Championships held at the Kazakhstan capital Astana. This is the first ever medal for any Bangladeshi athlete at Asian level athletics competition President of Asian Athletics Association Dahlan Jumaan Al Hamad of Qatar handed over the glittering gold medal to Bangladeshi wonder boy Imranur Rahman at a medal distribution ceremony in Astana  Sunday evening when the national flag of  Bangladesh hoisted for the time in Asian meet and national anthem was also played. General Secretary of Bangladesh Athletics Federation Advocate Abdur Rakib Montu, now in Kazakhstan as Bangladesh team leader, was also present on the occasion and confirmed it to UNB over phone Sunday evening. Read more: National Athletics: Army lead medal table with 15 golds, 11 silvers, 13 bronzes Imranur Rahman, the two times fastest man of Bangladesh since his appearances  in the country's  athletics last year,  brought laurel for the country within one year by clinching the 60- meter sprint gold medal in the Asian Indoor Athletics Championship in Astana Saturday night. The 29-year-old sprinter Imranur Rahman clinched country's dream gold by winning the men's 60-meter sprint title  with a record timing of  6.59 seconds. Earlier, Imranur, took 6.70 seconds in the event's heats to qualify for the semifinals and made an improved  timing of  6.61 seconds to move into the final as the second best on photo-finish behind a Qatari sprinter. In the event's final on Saturday night, the Bangladesh wonder boy  Imranur  further improved his personal best timing of 6.59 seconds to win a surprise gold medal for  the country. Read More: Imranur, Shirin to represent Bangladesh in Asian Indoor Athletics Imranur's previous best timing of  the event was 6.64 seconds, which he made in the World Indoor Athletics stage in Belgrade in 2022. However, Bangladesh's fastest women's sprinter Shirin Akter was eliminated from the heats of the 60-meter sprint clocking 7.93 seconds. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, State Minister for Youth and Sports M Zahid Ahsan Russell MP, Principal Secretary to Prime Minister and Athletics Federation President M Tofazzel Hossain Miah and BOA President General SM Shafiuddin Ahmed, in separate messages,  congratulated Imranur Rahman for bring laurel for the country. Read More: Glory brought to Bangladesh by women athletes changing public attitude, speakers say 

A murder case has been filed at Ishwardi Police Station in connection with the death of a Kazakhstan national in Ishwardi Rooppur Residential Project Green city in Ishwardi on Saturday night. Shvets Vladimir, 50, an employee of contractor firm NIKIMT at Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant, was found hacked to death at a house in the Green city, police said.  His brother, identified as Amere, was admitted to a hospital with injuries. A court in Pabna sent three Belarus citizens to jail on Monday, a day after Iurii Fedorov, director of the contracting firm, filed the case accusing them of committing the murder, said Raihan Pervez, sub-inspector of Ishwardi Police Station. The murder suspects are Urbanavichus Vitali, 44, Fedarovich Henadz, 42, and Matsveyeu Uladzimir, 43. They work at Russian company Rossem. Also read: Kazakhstan national killed in Rooppur Nuke plant site  The three Belarus nationals were earlier detained by police. Later they were shown arrested under the murder case. The body of the Kazakhstan national was kept at the mortuary of Dhaka Medical College and Hospital. In primary investigation police found that the two Kazakh brothers went to the room of three Belarus nationals to settle a monetary dispute. At one stage they got involved in heated arguments. Also read: Rooppur N-plant: 5 Russians die in 11 days, probe ordered Police are investigating the suspected murder,” said Raihan.

The mass protests in Kazakhstan began peacefully over the New Year's weekend, with marchers denouncing a sharp rise in fuel prices. They spread quickly from the western part of the Central Asian nation to more populous areas, eventually reaching its largest city of Almaty.But something changed over the course of a week.Groups of armed men appeared in Almaty, with some seen riding in cars without license plates or with their faces covered. Marchers at the peaceful protests say these men began urging them to storm government buildings, promising to give them guns.Clashes with police soon broke out, and by the night of Jan. 5, Almaty was in chaos. City Hall was burning, as were cars and buses; stores were looted; and attempts were made to storm the presidential residence. Gunshots were heard in the streets, the internet was blacked out, and even the airport was briefly seized. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has blamed the unrest on “terrorists” who received foreign training and support.But nearly two weeks after the events that led to scores of deaths and about 16,000 arrests, the government has not presented any evidence to support its allegation of outside involvement.It remains unclear whether these more violent actors were individuals taking advantage of the mayhem to loot and vandalize stores, or if they were part of organized groups with larger political motives.Protesters, however, say their rallies were somehow undermined, leading to the crackdown by security forces. Tokayev has said authorities didn't use force at peaceful demonstrations.Although the protests began over the higher price of fuel, the scope and the agenda of the demonstrations expanded quickly. Large crowds rallied in major cities, venting their frustration with worsening living conditions and inequality under the authoritarian government that has maintained a tight grip on power for over three decades in the energy-rich nation of 19 million.Much of that occurred under longtime leader Nursultan Nazarbayev, who stepped down in 2019 in favor of Tokayev, his hand-picked successor, but has maintained behind-the-scenes influence. The slogan “Shal ket!” — “Old man go!” — was chanted at rallies.“A significant part of the people are those who came at the call of their hearts to express their attitude towards the authorities, because they are tired, because they do not feel like the state is providing them with social security,” said human rights activist Galym Ageleuov, president of the Liberty Foundation.Tokayev initially tried to calm the crowds by announcing a 180-day cap on fuel prices and removing Nazarbayev as head of the National Security Council, a move widely seen as an attempt to end the former leader's patronage while also consolidating power.But the protests continued, and the violence escalated amid the peaceful rallies in Almaty.A protester whose first name is Bezshan said that on Jan. 5, armed men approached and asked young people in the crowd to help them storm a police station. “They said they would hand out weapons,” he told The Associated Press, recalling the incident more than a week later. AP has chosen not to publish the full names of protesters interviewed out of caution for their security.Beken, another protester, said he also saw “provocateurs” at the rally that day, urging an attack on police: “We tried to stop them as much as we could, telling them: ‘Everyone, stay put.' We don’t need weapons, we came out to a peaceful rally,” he said.On Jan. 6, security forces opened fire and killed dozens of protesters. At least 12 officers also were reported killed. The next day, Tokayev announced he had given security forces shoot-to-kill orders to halt the violent unrest, saying: “We intend to act with maximum severity regarding lawbreakers.”Almaty police spokeswoman Saltynat Azirbek called the Jan. 5 attack on the police department “a proper battle.”The attackers “didn't put forward any demands,” she told reporters. "They deliberately came to destroy, to kill.” READ: After Kazakhstan unrest, relatives await detainees' release She also insisted police were unarmed when working at unsanctioned demonstrations in Almaty, but she didn't clarify whether she meant the Jan. 6 rally.Amid the bloodshed, Tokayev also called in troops from the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a Russia-led military alliance of six former Soviet states, which helped restore order.Some saw the blaming of foreign instigators as a pretext for bringing in the mostly Russian forces.“In order to invite Russian troops, you need a serious reason ... that is not an internal standoff with the people," political analyst Dimash Alzhayev said in an interview. "So naturally, (the authorities) needed to come up with terrorists.”A protester named Marat told AP that the authorities "haven’t so far showed us a single terrorist,” citing only the highly publicized arrest of Vikram Ruzakhunov, a well-known jazz pianist from neighboring Kyrgyzstan.The musician appeared on Kazakh television after his arrest with large bruises on his face and said in the broadcast he had flown in and was promised money for participating in the protests.Kyrgyz authorities protested Ruzakhunov's arrest and demanded that Kazakhstan release him. He was freed shortly afterward, and upon returning to Kyrgyzstan said his statement on Kazakh TV was false — he was visiting a friend in Almaty and got swept up while trying to leave the city.Ruzakhnunov told a Kyrgyz broadcaster that while in jail, his cellmates said the quickest way to get released was to confess to a false story, so that’s what he did.Alzhanov, the analyst, noted that Kazakh state broadcasters amplified the government's message by repeatedly airing video of the turmoil."They continued broadcasting the visuals, so the government was interested in communicating them to a broad audience," he said, adding that the state of emergency that was declared provided a pretext to suppress the demonstrations with force. READ: Kazakhstan says 164 killed in last week's protests A protester named Daulet told AP that he believed the “security forces deliberately painted the protesters as some kind of a fringe group prepared to riot.”Beken, the protester who described seeing what he called “provocateurs,” criticized the security forces “for shooting at their own people.” He said a Jan. 6 rally he attended featured protesters walking toward the military with a white flag.“It is unfathomable. I can’t understand it. How is this possible?” he said.

With about 12,000 people arrested after anti-government protests in Kazakhstan last week, friends and relatives of those held by police waited outside a jail Wednesday, hoping to learn their fate. Some even went to morgues to see if a loved one was among the scores killed in the unprecedented violence in the Central Asian nation. Authorities have refused to allow relatives or lawyers to see those in custody, giving little information about them, according to human rights activists. The demonstrations began Jan. 2 in the western part of Kazakhstan over a sharp rise in fuel prices and spread throughout the country, apparently reflecting wider discontent with the government, which declared a state of emergency for the whole country and asked a Russia-led military alliance to send in troops to help restore order. Read: Kazakhstan says 164 killed in last week's protests Another 1,678 people were arrested in the past 24 hours in Almaty, the largest city that was hit hardest by the turmoil, and more than 300 criminal investigations have been opened. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev blamed the unrest on foreign-backed “terrorists,” but did not provide any evidence, and had given shoot-to-kill orders to security forces to quell the unrest. Outside a branch of the Internal Affairs department that housed a large detention center, a man who gave his name only as Renat said he has been waiting nearly a week to see or get any information about a close friend, Zhandos Nakipovich. He said Nakipovich, whom he described as being like “a brother” to him, was taken into custody on Jan. 4 during a peaceful protest. “He was at first held at a precinct, then they told us he was in the Internal Affairs department," Renat told The Associated Press. "Since Jan. 6, we’ve been here and we don’t know whether he’s alive or not.” Military checkpoints prevented anyone from getting close to the building. “Neither lawyers nor relatives — no one is allowed inside. Lawyers should be present during interrogation, but as you see, no one can pass,” said Galym Ageleuov, head of the Liberty human rights group, who was waiting at the barricade. “The checkpoint blocks the access for lawyers and relatives to see what’s going on there. We don’t even have the list of detainees,” Ageleuov said. More than a dozen men and women in dark winter clothes gathered outside one of Almaty's morgues, with some of them waiting to collect the bodies of relatives killed in the unrest. Huddled together in small groups, they stood at the gate of the facility, chatting quietly with each other but refused to talk to a reporter. Although the official death toll was announced as 164, Tokayev has said hundreds of civilians and security forces were killed and injured. Read:Kazakhstan adds uncertainty to talks with Russia on Ukraine Life in Almaty has started returning to normal after days of unrest that saw cars and buses torched, government buildings stormed and set ablaze, the airport seized and the sound of gunfire ringing out. The unrest had largely ended by last weekend. Public transportation has resumed and shopping malls reopened, and the only reminders of the violence were occasional military roadblocks and the charred exterior of city hall, which was set ablaze at the height of the rioting. Authorities in the energy-rich country of 19 million sought to mollify the anger at the government by capping fuel prices for 180 days. The Cabinet resigned, and longtime former leader Nursultan Nazarbayev was ousted from his influential post of head of the National Security Council. Nazarbayev had stepped down as president in 2019 after nearly three decades in power, but retained influence in the security forces. Tokayev requested help from the Collective Security Treaty Organization, or CSTO, a Russia-led military alliance of six ex-Soviet states. The bloc sent over 2,000 troops to Kazakhstan, and Tokayev said the troops will start withdrawing Thursday. 

Kazakhstan authorities said Sunday that 164 people, including a 4-year-old girl, were killed in a week of protests that marked the worst unrest since the former Soviet republic gained independence 30 years ago. The office of President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said order has been restored in the Central Asian country and that the government has regained control of all buildings that were taken over by the protesters. Some of the buildings were set on fire. Sporadic gunfire was heard Sunday in Almaty, the largest city in Kazakhstan, according to the Russian TV station Mir-24, but it was unclear whether those were warning shots by law enforcement. Tokayev said Friday he had authorized a shoot-to-kill order for police and the military to restore order. Read: Kazakhstan adds uncertainty to talks with Russia on Ukraine The demonstrations, which began in the western part of Kazakhstan, began Jan. 2. over a sharp rise in fuel prices and spread throughout the country, apparently reflecting wider discontent with the authoritarian government. They prompted a Russia-led military alliance to send troops to the country. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Tokayev's order “something I resolutely reject.” “The shoot-to-kill order, to the extent it exists, is wrong and should be rescinded,” he said Sunday on ABC's “This Week.” “And Kazakhstan has the ability to maintain law and order, to defend the institutions of the state, but to do so in a way that respects the rights of peaceful protesters and also addresses the concerns that they’ve raised – economic concerns, some political concerns,” Blinken added. The same party has ruled Kazakhstan since it gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Anyone aspiring to oppose the government has either been repressed, sidelined, or co-opted, amid widespread economic hardship despite the country's enormous reserves of oil, natural gas, uranium and minerals. About 5,800 people were detained during the unrest, Tokayev’s office said. The death toll of 164, reported by the state news channel Khabar-24 and citing the Health Ministry, was a significant increase from previously announced totals. It was unclear if that number referred only to civilians or if law enforcement deaths were included. Kazakh authorities said earlier Sunday that 16 members of the police or national guard had been killed. The ministry said 103 of the deaths occurred in Almaty, and Kazakhstan's ombudswoman for children's rights said three of those killed were minors, including a 4-year-old girl. The ministry earlier reported more than 2,200 people sought treatment for injuries, and the Interior Ministry said about 1,300 security officers were injured. Almaty’s airport, which had been taken over by protesters last week, remained closed but was expected to resume operations Monday. Tokayev said the demonstrations were instigated by “terrorists” with foreign backing, although the protests have shown no obvious leaders or organization. Sunday's statement from his office said the detentions included “a sizable number of foreign nationals,” but gave no details. It was unclear how many of those detained remained in custody. The foreign ministry of neighboring Kyrgyzstan on Sunday called for the release of well-known Kyrgyz musician Vikram Ruzakhunov, who was shown in a video on Kazakh television saying that he had flown to the country to take part in protests and was promised $200. In the video, apparently taken in police custody, Ruzakhunov's face was bruised and he had a large cut on his forehead. The former head of Kazakhstan’s counterintelligence and anti-terrorism agency has been arrested on charges of attempting to overthrow the government. The arrest of Karim Masimov, which was announced Saturday, came just days after he was removed as head of the National Security Committee by Tokayev. No details were given about what Masimov was alleged to have done that would constitute an attempted overthrow of the government. The National Security Committee, a successor to the Soviet-era KGB, is responsible for counterintelligence, the border guards service and anti-terrorist activities. As the unrest mounted, Kazakhstan's ministerial cabinet resigned but remained in their posts temporarily. Tokayev spokesman Brisk Uali said the president would propose a new cabinet on Tuesday. Read:Dozens of protesters, 12 police dead in Kazakhstan protests At Tokayev’s request, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a Russia-led military alliance of six former Soviet states, authorized sending about 2,500 mostly Russian troops to Kazakhstan as peacekeepers. Some of the force is guarding government facilities in the capital, Nur-Sultan, which “made it possible to release part of the forces of Kazakhstani law enforcement agencies and redeploy them to Almaty to participate in the counterterrorist operation,” according to a statement from Tokayev’s office. In a sign that the demonstrations were more deeply rooted than just over the fuel price rise, many demonstrators shouted “Old man out,” a reference to Nursultan Nazarbayev, who was president from Kazakhstan’s independence until he resigned in 2019 and anointed Tokayev as his successor. Nazarbayev retained substantial power as head of the National Security Council. But Tokayev replaced him as council head amid the unrest. possibly aiming at a concession to mollify protesters. However, Nazarbayev adviser Aido Ukibay said Sunday that it was done at Nazarbayev's initiative, according to the Kazakh news agency KazTag.

President Abdul Hamid on Wednesday called upon the OIC member countries to make better use of science and technology in alleviation of poverty through sustainable development. "Science and Technology will work as a game changer in poverty alleviation and sustainable development," he said while addressing the second OIC (Organization of Islamic Cooperation) summit on science and technology. The virtual summit at Kazakhstan’s capital Nur-Sultan carried the theme “Science, Technology and Innovation: Opening New Horizons”. Read: SSF chief calls on President Hamid on its founding anniversry The president said the collaboration can be done on dedicated projects bilaterally or on collective basis. “Many OIC member states have similar strengths and prospects in different areas and we can complement each other,” he said. He also called upon scientists and researchers from OIC member country to exchange their expertise and knowledge in these fields. He said that Bangladesh is giving special emphasis to scientific research, sustainable and environment friendly technology, peaceful uses of nuclear energy in the field of food and agriculture, health, power, human resource development, blue economy and so on.  "We have already entered the elite nuclear club by constructing a 2 thousand 400 Megawatt nuclear power plant in Rooppur," he added. Bangladesh, he said, is promoting nuclear medicine, nanotechnology, food processing and preservation, modern biotechnology, gene banking and blue economy resources.  Hamid also proposed some ideas for joint plan of action like collaboration for Research and Development among OIC member states with OIC institutional support, establishment of high-tech industry and implementation of gradual clustering projects under IDB co-financing arrangement, development of mechanisms, networks and associations of scientists and entrepreneurs, incubation support for OIC-wide commercial application of innovations and job creation and technology transfer among member states.

The Senior Officials’ Committee (SOC) meeting of Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) on Friday discussed the regional situation shaped by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Eight people were killed and 40 injured in an outburst of violence in a town in Kazakhstan where about 30 homes were also set on fire, the country's interior minister said Saturday.

For the past four days, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been calling for authoritarian governments in eastern Europe and Central Asia to ease restrictions on press freedom despite criticism for his own treatment of journalists at home.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Sunday pressed Kazakhstan to be wary of Chinese investment and influence, urging the Central Asian nation and others to join calls demanding an end to China's repression of minorities.