Category: Food Security


  • Bangladesh President Appreciates U.S. Help And Hopes for More

    Bangladesh President Appreciates U.S. Help And Hopes for More

    Lee Lescaze, Washington Post (August 28, 1980) Bangladesh President Ziaur Rahman met with President Carter yesterday to thank the United States for past assistance and explain Bangladesh’s need for even more aid in the future. Zia told a press conference that the White House meeting “was extremely useful to us.” Bangladesh, one of the world’s…

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  • President Zia Has Reputation as ‘Bangladesh’s No. 1 Motivator’

    President Zia Has Reputation as ‘Bangladesh’s No. 1 Motivator’

    Stuart Auerbach, Washington Post (March 28, 1981) Ten years ago today an obscure Army major named Ziaur Rahman proclaimed to the world over a captured radio station Bangladesh’s independence. Now Zia, a retired general, is Bangladesh’s president. Zia is described by correspondents who cover him regularly as “Bangladesh’s number one motivator.” His agriculture secretary, A.…

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  • Bangladeshi Villagers Despair at Loss of President

    Bangladeshi Villagers Despair at Loss of President

    William Branigin, Washington Post (June 3, 1981) Iman Ali Sarder paused by the side of the road outside this village northeast of Dacca, holding up an old black umbrella with a carved, wooden handle to shade himself from the blazing sun. The 67-year-old farmer listened stoically to a visitor’s question, but as he answered a…

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  • Remarks of the Presidents: Meeting between Carter & Zia

    Remarks of the Presidents: Meeting between Carter & Zia

    President Ziaur Rahman is the first Bangladeshi President to be invited to the White House of the United States as a president’s guest. He went to visit President Jimmy Carter, the 39th President of the United States at the Oval Office on August 27, 1980. After their 20-minute-long meeting, they met key officials in the…

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  • Zia’s exchange of letters with President Carter on food assistance

    Zia’s exchange of letters with President Carter on food assistance

    Bangladesh suffered from a famine in 1974 and due to the growing population problem, despite some immediate steps taken by the Zia administration, was struggling to harvest sufficient food for a country with a population of nine million. To avert another famine, Ziaur Rahman personally encouraged leaders of the developed world to provide food assistance…

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  • The Times Biography: Zia Ur-Rahman

    The Times Biography: Zia Ur-Rahman

    The Times: Biography (June 1, 19781) President Zia ur-Rahman of Bangladesh, who was killed at the age of 45 in Chittagong on May 30 during an insurrection against the government, had been the effective instrument of power in the country since soon after the overthrow and assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman by a group of…

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  • Don’t Write Off Bangladesh

    Don’t Write Off Bangladesh

    The New York Times Editorial (June 12, 1981) At first glance, the recent news from Bangladesh seems only to confirm that nation’s pathetic image. Born out of a fracturing of Pakistan only a decade ago, Bangladesh early on gained a reputation as an international ”basket case,” a metaphor for misery and hopelessness. Only charity and…

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  • Where to Look for Aid: New Ideas for Third World

    Where to Look for Aid: New Ideas for Third World

    Bernard D. Nossiter, The New York Times (August 29, 1980) Maj. Gen. Ziaur Rahman, the President of Bangladesh, has been uttering heresy at the United Nations bargaining session between rich and poor. Unlike most spokesmen here for developing countries, General Zia does not think that the task of aiding the poor is exclusively a Western…

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  • Ziaur Rahman was strict leader who tried to give nation direction

    Ziaur Rahman was strict leader who tried to give nation direction

    Les Ledbetter, The New York Times (May 31, 1981) When Maj. Gen. Ziaur Rahman seized power in Bangladesh six years ago, he was hailed as the strict leader that the struggling nation needed. After the coup that gave him the presidency, the soft-spoken military man was described as hard-working and incorruptible in his personal life…

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  • Murder in Chittagong

    Murder in Chittagong

    FRED BRUNING, Newsweek (June 8, 1981) Several times a week President Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh liked to board a government helicopter and hopscotch across his impoverished country spreading a gospel of hard work and self-help. Last Friday his schedule called for a stopover in the steamy port city of Chittagong, where the Presidential party would…

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