Bangladesh has been hit by a wave of violence before a court verdict due against the toppled longtime Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, with her party calling for a nationwide “lockdown” to protest the case.
Schools in the capital Dhaka and other major cities went online on Thursday amid severe transport disruption, following a sharp rise in attacks.
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As tensions mounted, the country’s authorities recorded 32 crude bomb explosions on Wednesday, with dozens of buses set on fire across the country.
No casualties were reported when two more crude bombs went off near Dhaka airport on Thursday night.
The interim government of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus has increased security measures, deploying 400 soldiers from the paramilitary Border Guard across the capital.
Meanwhile, checkpoints have been strengthened and public gatherings heavily restricted.
The recent violence has included a fire bomb being thrown at a government office in Gopalganj district, which is Hasina’s ancestral home. Local media also reported that an office of Grameen Bank, which Yunus founded, was torched in eastern Bangladesh on Wednesday.
Police have arrested dozens of supporters of Hasina’s Awami League party over their alleged involvement in explosions and sabotage.
Hasina, who fled to India last August during deadly antigovernment protests, is being tried in absentia for crimes against humanity. She denies any wrongdoing, claiming the trial is politically motivated.
The 78-year-old is accused of being the “mastermind and principal architect” behind Bangladeshi security forces’ violent suppression of demonstrations last year, which were prompted by a controversial government job-quota system.
As many as 1,400 people may have been killed in the violence, according to the United Nations.
Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) personnel stand guard outside the High Court in Dhaka on November 12, 2025 [AFP]
The daughter of Bangladesh’s founding father, former President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Hasina first came to power in 1996, six years after she led a pro-democracy uprising that toppled the military ruler Hossain Muhammad Ershad.
After becoming prime minister again in 2009, Hasina ruled for 15 years until last August. Rights groups say her second premiership was autocratic, pointing to abuses such as arrests, disappearances and extrajudicial killings.
Yunus, the interim prime minister, said he inherited a “completely” broken political system from her.
The 85-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner announced on Thursday that the nation of 170 million would hold a referendum on a national charter signed last month. It will take place on the same day as parliamentary elections in February, he said.
The United States and South Korea have released details of a trade agreement that includes a $150bn Korean investment in the US shipbuilding sector, and both countries agree to “move forward” on building nuclear-powered submarines.
Under the agreement, President Lee Jae Myung said on Friday that South Korea will build nuclear-powered submarines as part of a new partnership with Washington on shipbuilding, artificial intelligence and the nuclear industry.
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A fact sheet released by the White House said the US gave approval for Seoul to build nuclear-powered submarines and that South Korea will invest an additional $200bn in US industrial sectors in addition to the $150bn in shipbuilding.
South Korea’s official Yonhap news agency said Seoul’s investment was in return for Washington’s lowering of trade tariffs on Korean goods to 15 percent from 25 percent.
“One of the greatest variables for our economy and security – the bilateral negotiations on trade, tariffs and security – has been finalised,” President Lee said at a news conference on Friday, adding the two countries had agreed to “move forward with building nuclear-powered submarines”.
“The United States has given approval for the ROK [Republic of Korea] to build nuclear-powered attack submarines,” Lee said.
Seoul also secured “support for expanding our authority over uranium enrichment and spent-fuel reprocessing”, he said.
The joint fact sheet outlining the deal said both sides would “collaborate further through a shipbuilding working group” to “increase the number of US commercial ships and combat-ready US military vessels “.
Yonhap also reported that South Korea is seeking to acquire “four or more 5,000-ton conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines by the mid-2030s “.
South Korea’s development of nuclear-powered vessels would provide a significant boost to its naval and defence industries, allowing Seoul to join a select group of countries with such technological capabilities, analysts say.
China had already voiced concern over a Washington-Seoul deal on nuclear submarine technology.
Such a partnership “goes beyond a purely commercial partnership, directly touching on the global nonproliferation regime and the stability of the Korean Peninsula and the wider region,” China’s Ambassador in Seoul Dai Bing told reporters on Thursday.
North Korea did not immediately comment on the development, but is likely to respond. Pyongyang has consistently accused Washington and Seoul of building up military forces on the North’s borders in preparation for an invasion one day.
Details remain murky on where the nuclear submarines will be built.
US President Donald Trump said on social media last month that “South Korea will be building its Nuclear Powered Submarine in the Philadelphia Shipyards, right here in the good ol’ U.S.A”.
However, Seoul’s national security adviser Wi Sung-lac said on Friday that “from start to finish, the leaders’ discussion proceeded on the premise that construction would take place in South Korea”.
New Delhi, India – Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s cabinet late Wednesday described the car explosion which jolted New Delhi earlier in the week as a “heinous terror incident, perpetrated by antinational forces”.
The Indian government’s words, two days after a slow-moving car blew up near the Red Fort, an iconic 17th-century monument in New Delhi, killing at least 13 people and wounding several, have since led to questions about how it might respond, raising concerns over the prospect of a new spike in regional tensions.
Earlier this year, in May, the Indian government had declared a new security doctrine: “Any act of terror will be treated as an act of war.”
That posture had come in the aftermath of an intense four-day air war between India and Pakistan, after India blamed Islamabad for an attack in Indian-administered Kashmir that killed 26 civilians.
Now, six months later, as India grapples with another attack – this time, in the heart of the national capital of the world’s most populous country – the Modi government has so far avoided blaming Pakistan.
Instead, say political analysts, New Delhi’s language suggests that it might be veering towards intensifying a crackdown on Kashmir, at a time when Islamophobia and anti-Kashmiri sentiments have skyrocketed across India in the aftermath of the car explosion.
Ambulances are kept on standby on a blood-spattered road at the blast site after an explosion near the Red Fort in the old quarters of Delhi on November 10, 2025. At least 13 people were killed and 19 injured when a car exploded in the heart of the Indian capital, New Delhi’s deputy fire chief told AFP [Sajjad Hussain/AFP]
A crackdown in Kashmir
Even before the blast in New Delhi, police teams from Indian-administered Kashmir had been carrying out raids across the national capital region, following a lead from Srinagar, which led to the seizure of a significant amount of explosives and arrests of nearly a dozen individuals.
Among the suspects are several Kashmiri doctors – including Umar Nabi, a junior doctor who is suspected of being the driver of the car that exploded – who were serving in hospitals in satellite towns outside New Delhi.
Since the explosion near the Red Fort, police in Indian-administered Kashmir have detained more than 650 people from across the Valley as they dig deeper into what sections of the Indian media are describing as a “white-collar terror module” that had gathered enough explosives for the biggest attack on India in decades, if members hadn’t been arrested.
Police teams have raided several locations, including the residences of members of banned sociopolitical outfits.
Indian forces on Thursday also demolished the home of Nabi, the alleged car driver. In recent years, Indian authorities have often demolished homes of individuals accused of crimes without any judicial order empowering them to do so, even though the Supreme Court has ordered an end to the practice. Rights groups have described the act of demolishing the homes of suspects as a form of collective punishment.
Students of medicine and practising doctors in Kashmir are also increasingly facing scrutiny – more than 50 have been questioned for hours, and some have had their devices seized for investigation.
“There is a sense of complete disbelief among all of us,” said a junior doctor at a government-run hospital in Srinagar, the capital of the federal territory of Indian-administered Kashmir.
The doctor requested anonymity to speak, fearing repercussions from the police.
The 34-year-old has seen conflict in Kashmir up close, treating injured protesters firsthand for weeks on end, during previous clashes with security forces. “But I never thought that we would be viewed with suspicion like this,” he said, adding that the explosion that killed 13 in New Delhi was “unfortunate and should be condemned”.
“It is unreal to us that a doctor can think of such an attack,” the doctor said. “But how does that malign our entire fraternity? If a professional defects and joins militants, does it mean that all professionals are terrorists?”
Security personnel check for evidence at the blast site following an explosion near the Red Fort in the old quarters of Delhi on November 11, 2025 [Arun Sankar/AFP]
‘Away from Pakistan, towards an enemy within’
India and Pakistan have fought three wars over Kashmir since the nations were partitioned in 1947 as the British left the subcontinent. Today, India, Pakistan and China all control parts of Kashmir. India claims all of it, and Pakistan seeks control of all of Kashmir except the parts held by China, its ally.
After the April attack in the resort town of Pahalgam in Indian-administered Kashmir, India had launched missiles deep inside Pakistan. Modi claimed that the attacks killed more than 100 “terrorists”. Pakistan insisted that civilians and soldiers, not armed fighters, were killed. Pakistan, which had rejected Indian accusations of a role in the April killings in Pahalgam, hit back.
Over four days, the nuclear-armed neighbours fired missiles and drones across their contested border, striking each other’s military bases.
When the Modi government agreed to a ceasefire on May 10, it faced domestic criticism from the opposition – and some sections of its own supporters – for not continuing with attacks on Pakistan. The government then said Operation Sindoor is “only on pause, not over”.
Six months later, though, New Delhi has been significantly more cautious about who to blame for the Delhi blast.
“There is a lot of due outrage this time, but there is no mention of Pakistan,” said Anuradha Bhasin, a veteran editor in Kashmir and author of a book, A Dismantled State: The Untold Story of Kashmir After Article 370, about how the region changed under the Hindu majoritarian Modi government. The Kashmir administration has banned her book in the region.
“This time, it is not about a crackdown on Pakistan,” she told Al Jazeera. “The public anger is being directed away from Pakistan, towards ‘an enemy within’.”
She said the Modi government appeared to be aware that finger-pointing at Pakistan “would create pressure from the public to take [military] action” against the neighbour.
Instead, she said, “public anger can be assuaged by creating any enemy.”
Gayatri Devi, mother of Pankaj Sahni, who died in a deadly explosion near the historic Red Fort in the old quarters of Delhi, reacts next to Sahni’s body outside his home before the funeral, in New Delhi, India, November 11, 2025 [Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters]
‘Pandering to domestic gallery’
Analysts point to the Modi government’s use of the term “antinational forces” to describe the alleged perpetrators of the Delhi attack.
That’s a phrase the Modi government has previously used to describe academics, journalists and students who have criticised it, as well as other protesters and dissidents. Since Modi took office in 2014, India has continuously slid in multiple democracy indices for alleged persecution of minorities in the country and its crackdown on press freedom.
To Sumantra Bose, a political scientist whose work focuses on the intersection of nationalism and conflict in South Asia, the Indian cabinet resolution was significant in the way that it shied “away from naming and blaming Pakistan, which was a rather reflexive reaction for decades”.
After the fighting in May, the Indian government learned, the hard way, Bose said, that “there is no appetite and indeed no tolerance anywhere in the world for a military escalation in South Asia.”
Bose was referring to the lukewarm global support that India received after it bombed Pakistan without providing any public evidence of Islamabad’s links with the attackers in Pahalgam.
Instead, India was left disputing the repeated assertions of United States President Donald Trump that he had brokered the ceasefire between New Delhi and Islamabad, even as he hosted Pakistan’s army chief, praised him, and strengthened ties with India’s western neighbour. India has long held the position that all disputes with Pakistan must be resolved bilaterally, without intervention from any other country.
The contrast in New Delhi’s response to this week’s blast, so far, appears to have struck US State Secretary Marco Rubio, too.
Reacting to the Delhi blast, Rubio said “it clearly was a terrorist attack,” and “the Indians need to be commended. They’ve been very measured, cautious, and very professional on how they’re carrying out this investigation.”
India’s new security doctrine – that an act of terror is an act of war – “was a dangerous, slippery slope”, said Bose, who has also authored books on the conflict in Kashmir. His last work, Kashmir at the Crossroads: Inside a 21st-Century Conflict, published in 2021, is also banned in Kashmir.
The doctrine, he said, was aimed at pandering to Modi’s “domestic gallery” – a way of showing muscular strength, even at the risk of “serious military escalation” between India and Pakistan.
Now, by using terms like “white-collar terrorism”, analysts said Indian officials risked blurring the line between Kashmiri Muslims and armed rebels fighting Indian rule.
“The term doesn’t make sense to me, but it does put the needle of suspicion on young, educated Muslim professionals,” said Bose.
“The fact has been for decades that militants come from all sorts of social backgrounds in Kashmir – from rural farming families, working-class backgrounds, to educated professionals,” Bose argued. “If anything, it reflects the discontent that has been in the society across the groups.”
Bhasin, the editor from Kashmir, said the Indian government’s posture would lead to “adverse economic impact for Kashmiri Muslims and further ghettoisation, where they find it harder to get jobs or a place to rent”.
A supporter of India’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) holds a placard during a rally expressing solidarity with the Indian armed forces, in Srinagar, on May 15, 2025, following a ceasefire between Pakistan and India [Tauseef Mustafa/AFP]
‘Everyone is so scared’
Kashmiris across India are already facing the brunt of hate and anger following the Delhi blast.
Since the bomb exploded on Monday in New Delhi, Indian social media platforms have been rife with rampant hate speech against Muslims.
Nasir Khuehami, the national convener of a Kashmiri student association, has spent four days fielding calls from Kashmiri Muslims.
“Across northern Indian states, Kashmiris are being asked to vacate their homes, there is active profiling going on, and everyone is so scared,” Khuehami told Al Jazeera, speaking from his home in Kashmir.
This is only the latest instance of this pattern playing out: An attack in Kashmir, or by a Kashmiri armed rebel, has often led to harassment and beating of Kashmiri Muslims – students, professionals, traders, or even labourers – living in India.
Khuehami said “to end this endless cycle of crises for Kashmiris” – where they are detained at home and abused outside – “the government needs to take confidence-building measures.”
Otherwise, Khuehami said, the Modi government was marginalising Kashmiris in India. By doing that, he said, India would be playing into the hands of the very country it accuses of wanting to grab Kashmir: Pakistan.
Kylian Mbappe hit a brace while Michael Olise and Hugo Ekitike also scored as France thrashed Ukraine 4-0 to secure World Cup qualification, after an evening marked by tributes to the victims of the 2015 Paris attacks.
Captain Mbappe coolly chipped in from the spot 10 minutes into the second half at the Parc des Princes on Thursday, and the impressive Olise doubled France’s lead on 76 minutes.
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Mbappe then struck again and Ekitike swept in a first goal for his country, as France got the win they required to clinch their spot at the 2026 finals in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
A minute’s silence was impeccably observed before kickoff by the 41,000 spectators as France marked the 10th anniversary of the attacks in and around Paris on November 13, 2015.
Most of the 130 victims of the attacks were killed at the Bataclan concert hall in the capital, where they were attending a concert.
One person also died near the Stade de France in the northern Paris suburb of Saint-Denis, where multiple explosions took place as suicide bombers attempted to enter the ground during a friendly between Les Bleus and Germany.
Didier Deschamps was the coach then and remains in charge now, with the approaching World Cup to be his final tournament before stepping down.
With one game still to come in Azerbaijan on Sunday, France have an unassailable six-point lead over both Iceland and Ukraine at the top of European qualifying Group D.
Winners of the World Cup in 2018 and runners-up in 2022, France maintain their record of having made it to every edition of the tournament since missing out on a place in the US in 1994.
While they can look forward to the draw for the finals, which takes place in Washington, DC, on December 5, Ukraine and Iceland meet each other on Sunday in a showdown to decide who continues into the playoffs next March.
France’s only slip-up in qualifying came in a draw in Iceland last month, although they have rarely found their fluid best during a low-key campaign.
Mbappe and Olise were in fine fettle here at Paris Saint-Germain’s home ground, though, while Bradley Barcola came closest to scoring in the first half with a curling effort from outside the area that was tipped onto the woodwork and behind for a corner.
Real Madrid superstar Mbappe, the France captain, then chipped in from the spot to open the scoring early in the second half after Olise had been fouled inside the area.
Olise, of Bayern Munich, really came into his own after being shifted from the right to a more central role.
It was shortly after setting up Ekitike to hit the post that Olise turned and fired in France’s second goal, and Ukraine caved in towards the end.
Mbappe scored from close range in the 83rd minute after Ekitike had been denied, taking him to 55 goals for his country and to within two of all-time top marksman Olivier Giroud’s tally of 57.
Mbappe fends off Illia Zabarnyi of Ukraine at Parc des Princes in Paris [Franco Arland/Getty Images]
Liverpool’s Ekitike then rounded off a fine move to wrap up the victory with his first senior international goal.
Deschamps said the performance was professional rather than spectacular, but enough to complete the mission.
“Always appreciate the good moments, even if it seems logical and natural for the France team to qualify. The objective was to qualify here tonight in a heavy, weighty context. The first half was difficult against a low block,” he said.
“I enjoy it, even if it’s not the first time – the France team has to be there at every major tournament.”
Elsewhere, Portugal star Cristiano Ronaldo was sent off for elbowing Ireland defender Dara O’Shea in the second half of a shock 2-0 defeat at Ireland.
Ronaldo now risks a two-game ban, which would see him missing the first match of the World Cup tournament if Portugal qualifies.
Portugal will host last-place Armenia in the final qualifying game on Sunday, when Hungary hosts Ireland at the same time. Portugal top Group F with 10 points, two ahead of Hungary. Ireland is third with seven points.
Earlier, Erling Haaland scored twice as Norway moved even closer to qualifying for the World Cup for the first time since 1998 by beating Estonia 4-1 in Oslo. The win virtually secures a spot for the high-scoring Norwegians in next year’s tournament.
Already-qualified England beat Serbia 2-0 at Wembley Stadium to keep a perfect record in Group K and are yet to concede a goal.
The United States has called on the United Nations Security Council to officially back its draft resolution aimed at bolstering President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan, warning that Palestinians could suffer “grave consequences” if it does not.
The call came as Russia presented the council with its own “counter-proposal” on Gaza, challenging Washington’s draft, according to a copy seen by the Reuters news agency.
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A spokesperson for the US mission to the UN said in a Thursday statement that “attempts to sow discord” around Washington’s resolution would only result in “grave, tangible, and entirely avoidable consequences” for Palestinians in Gaza should the ceasefire break down and Israel resume its assault.
The US mission formally circulated its draft resolution to the 15 UNSC members last week for negotiations on the wording and substance of the text.
According to a draft of the text seen by the AFP news agency, it would authorise a two-year mandate running until the end of 2027 for a transitional governance body in Gaza – known as the “Board of Peace” – that Trump would chair.
It would also authorise member states to form a “temporary International Stabilization Force (ISF)” that would work on the “permanent decommissioning of weapons from non-state armed groups” in Gaza, protect civilians and secure humanitarian aid corridors.
The ISF would also work with Israel, Egypt, and newly trained Palestinian police to help secure border areas and demilitarise the enclave.
Trump has ruled out sending US troops into Gaza as part of the proposed 20,000-strong force.
Washington says discussions have been held with Indonesia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Qatar, Turkiye and Azerbaijan about contributing to the force, but reservations remain about sending soldiers due to fears they could come into direct conflict with Hamas.
Unlike previous drafts, the latest iteration also references a possible future Palestinian state, saying “conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood” once the Palestinian Authority (PA) has carried out the requested reforms.
“The United States will establish a dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians to agree on a political horizon for peaceful and prosperous coexistence,” the resolution adds.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday he was optimistic the resolution would be adopted, saying “good progress” was being made on negotiations around its language.
But despite broad support for a “Board of Peace” among UNSC members, serious questions remain regarding the lack of any mention in the text of any oversight mechanism for the body, the PA’s future role, or concrete details about the ISF’s mandate, AFP reports.
With these significant question marks still hanging over the US proposal, Russia presented its own counter-resolution to the UNSC on Thursday.
“The objective of our draft is to enable the Security Council to develop a balanced, acceptable, and unified approach toward achieving a sustainable cessation of hostilities,” the note said.
On October 8, Trump announced that Israel and Hamas had agreed to the first phase of his much-touted 20-point peace plan for Gaza, pausing the two-year conflict which has seen Israeli forces kill at least 69,179 people in the enclave.
The deal has also facilitated the exchange of Israeli captives held in the enclave – alive and deceased – for Palestinian prisoners, as well as the partial withdrawal of Israeli troops and the entry of some humanitarian aid.
While the ceasefire remains in place, Israel has repeatedly violated the agreement with near-daily attacks that have killed hundreds of Palestinians.
Pointing to this “fragile” ceasefire in its Thursday note to the UNSC, the US mission urged the body to “unite and move forward to secure the peace that is desperately needed” by backing Washington’s resolution.
Israeli forces continue to carry out attacks despite the ceasefire in Gaza, where hundreds of people have been killed since a deal was agreed. Here’s what the numbers tell us.
