Category: Political Stability
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Post-1975 policies of Zia shaped Bangladesh’s development: Stefan Dercon
Professor Stefan Dercon of Oxford University explained Bangladesh’s social and economic development.
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‘Solid administrator Zia emerged from the chaos’, Eisenbraun on Zia
In an interview archived in the Library of Congress, the U.S. diplomat Stephen E. Eisenbraun discussed the rise of Ziaur Rahman, how 1977 October coup shaped his thoughts and his invitation to the White House. The relevant parts of the long interview have been published here for the readers. Q: You got to Bangladesh when? EISENBRAUN: July…
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‘Americans caught as much by surprise as Bangladeshis’, Eisenbraun on August 15
In an interview archived in the Library of Congress, the U.S. diplomat Stephen E. Eisenbraun discussed Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s rule as both Prime Minister and President and his assassination during a brutal coup. The relevant parts of the long interview have been published here for the readers. Q: You were discussing previously that they asked…
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Dacca: A Lingering Illness
Lewis M. Simons, Washington Post (November 19, 1975) `Terminally sick nations, unlike sick people, don’t die,” a Bengali newspaper editor said mournfully one recent evening. “But they linger and linger and linger. That’s what’s happening to our Bangladesh.” Bangladesh most certainly is very sick. Its leaders have been murdered, its political parties ground into extinction,…
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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
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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UK Foreign Office’s confidential letter on Zia
President Ziaur Rahman paid an official visit to the United Kingdom in June 1980 that made headlines in The Times and The Guardian. A letter was sent to the Prime Minister’s office when he expressed his willingness to visit the United Kingdom and have a discussion with Prime Minister Margaret Hilda Thatcher from the Foreign…
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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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Without Zia, Less Chance for the ‘Peaceful Revolution’
WILLIAM BORDERS, The New York Times (June 7, 1981) If the population of the entire world were squeezed into the continental United States, that land would be about as densely populated as Bangladesh is now. That is the kind of illustration prized by the legions of aid and development experts who for years have been…
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Bangladesh’s Soft‐Spoken but Strict President
One hot, sultry evening two years ago, shortly after he had taken over as the military ruler of Bangladesh, Maj. Gen. Ziaur Rahman was sitting in the living room of his white‐stone bungalow here explaining the country’s international relations. When a reporter raised the possibility of a regional alliance in southern Asia, General Zia paused…
Zia Archive 