Image is of vehicles set aflame by protestors near a government building.
Since July 1st, students have protested the unpopular proposal in which 30% of government jobs would be reserved for veterans of the 1971 War of Independence and their relatives. In a country with a youth unemployment rate of around 20% and a population of 170 million, a large number of otherwise eligible and competent people would have been forced out due to favouritism for veterans. As with basically every country on the planet over the last couple years, Bangladesh is suffering from inflation and an increasing cost-of-living, further exacerbating tensions.
The student protests have been met with significant violence by the government - local newspapers report that over a hundred protestors have been killed, and thousands have been injured. Guns and tear gas have been used. Additionally, the government has completely cut internet access throughout Bangladesh to prevent organizing, which has had some success in dividing protestors, but has also only further angered various parts of the country due to the massive impact to Bangladesh's online industries and various startups. And a national curfew has been in place to limit movement, with the population told to remain home if they want to be safe.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court of Bangladesh relented, stating that now, only 5% of government jobs would be reserved for veterans and their families. 2% would be allocated to members of minorities, with the remaining 93% distributed on merit. A period of tentative calm has arrived, but Hasnat Abdullah, a coordinator of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, has stated that unless the government restores the internet, removes the curfew, releases detainees, and forces certain ministers to resign within a few days, then the protests will resume.
The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.
The Country of the Week is Bangladesh! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
Please check out the HexAtlas!
The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Rumors are Flying around about some 50 or so dead and wounded British and French Nato soldiers in Odessa after a Russian precion strike.
Did these
BazurmanCondottiere thought they could just stroll around in Odessa speaking French and English.... le lol...Uh oh, the westerners are going to be big mad again that they traveled to a warzone to fight and the enemy shot at them
remeber the first days when there was a bunch of rotten Condottiere sharing the premium inside that in this war the Enemy also has artillery and Airpower and they are the Goat-herders this time around ..
i kind of enjoyed that ..
Good stuff
"One Guy opened fire with an AK on an APC and was killed immidiatly"
my god the scene this paints in my Head
pew pew ! "what are you doing ? thats an APC ! you gonna give away our BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR BRRRRRRRRRR....
Guy probably just wanted to respawn at a different location
I like how that wouldn't even work in most video games and this dumbass had a go anyway
"simply risk mitigating"
sounds more like this is the first "fair" fight he's encountered
Folks out there discovering that war actually is hell, and the US hasn't fought one in generations.
My favorite one was a couple ex-SF guys complaining they were being used as regular infantry in a trench instead of given "special missions" and how they weren't able to just call in airstrikes or helicopter medivacs
One of the features of this war that has interested me the most is how widely publicized these foreign mercenaries were at the beginning of the war and how coverage steadily dropped off into nothing (for no reason I'm sure, ignore the smoking craters left by artillery and airstrikes) over time. You look up these individual units that have great initial coverage, maybe a mention of them participating in the '23 counter offensive, and then just nothing. It's obvious they're just getting churned into meat and bone but I guess you can't publish that if you want to lure in more suckers.
It reminds me of a guy from my parents church that went over there and died. Supposedly he went over as a medic/in a humanitarian role but ended up in killed in combat and no one knows why. My personal theory is the Ukrainians just snag anyone they think won't be missed (in this case some dipshit foreigner) and throw them in the trenches to die.
https://t.me/mod_russia/41297
From the horse's mouth (auto translated):
How much instructing do you think they planned for what they stupidly thought was going to be a 3 year operation? It's probably all NATO people pushing the buttons in ergonomic chairs while expendable slavs are getting droned in trenches.
Kharkiv region , damn you (bad at geography) rumours ..
They're rumors until I see it from reputable media
what if i see it from a reputable source, but dont tell you about it ?
i could not not tell you , now that i have a reputable source - Russian MoD
I don't ask for much, but pls don't take this from me
this dude is the source apperently .. i dont speak spanish tho..
https://geoestratego.com/
is that meant to be бусурман?
I dont speak russian .. Bazurman as in Merchanaries / hired Guns / Bandits / Desperados..
Merchanaris is to hard to spell for me ...
Edit: oh no.. somthing got lost in Translation ..so in Russian that just means "Muslim" ??? oh oh oh.. fix that
:
Meowcinaries, mercenaries, potato catatoes