Completely unjustified red alerts and the like --warning their citizens about the risks of visiting Bangladesh--indulged in by some mainly western countries, not only represent poor policy making on their part but the same is also understandably seen here as unfair and unfriendly acts against this country

�Two drops from the sky don�t make a rain�: Russian ambassador

Ever since the murder of an Italian national in Dhaka quickly followed by a similar killing of a Japanese national in Rangpur, a number of  Western countries were seen overreacting to these incidents by hoisting alerts for their citizens suggesting caution in visiting Bangladesh. Of course, prior to these twin murders, the Australian cricket team cancelled their scheduled trip to Bangladesh on the same plea.
Notably, right after these developments, Bangladesh government and its security agencies have spared no efforts to ensure the security of foreign nationals staying in Bangladesh. In their several meetings with our foreign ministry officials since these happenings, members of  the diplomatic community generally as well as individually, seemed to express their satisfaction due to what things the government of Bangladesh (GOB) have been doing to take care of their security needs.
Thus, it was to be expected that these countries would either downsize their alerts or start progressively withdrawing them. But nothing of the sort happened. Rather some of them, especially the USA, UK and Canada upgraded their alerts to  higher levels and warned their nationals about the ‘high risks’ of visiting Bangladesh.
Needless to say, such reactions on the part of the Western countries even after admitting that the security situation in Bangladesh presently is not so bad and government here is effectively doing all in its powers not to allow any apprehensions to come true,  are likely to be interpreted as deliberate hostile acts against Bangladesh. If for  sticking to their irrational stand, relations between Bangladesh and these countries suffer, then who should take the blame for it ? Surely, Bangladesh has not taken any initiative towards this undesirable  end.
But the excessive sensitivity of these countries is poised to take a heavy toll on our economy. Today, Bangladesh’s RMG exports constitute nearly 86 per cent of its total export volumes of commodities. But this singularly most important item in our export basket is facing a very difficult situation from the alert mongering by these countries. Now is the time of the year when buyers in hordes come to Bangladesh to place orders with our garments producers .
But an important meeting with buyers’ representatives was cancelled recently as they requested a cancellation of the meeting citing the security situation in Bangladesh as a pretext. As it is, the arrival of buyers to Bangladesh has come down to a trickle after declaring these alerts and their upgrading . Our garments industries, thus, are faced with a dire situation of drying up of their businesses.
Another important and upcoming sector of our economy, tourism, faces a worse predicament as foreign tourists in great number are getting frightened and they are deciding to drop their even firmed up plans to come to Bangladesh. The same can be said about many intending or potential foreign  investors. In sum, the issuing of the travel alerts  and mindlessly upgrading them, are about to pave the ground for great economic setbacks to occur in  this country.
Western  diplomats-past and present-always emphasise before our audiences that they wish the best to happen to Bangladesh in their hearts. But are the reactions on their part -nowadays- proving to be sincere in this respect?
 As for the actual security situation prevailing in Bangladesh, it should suffice to say that the same is distinctly better than in the complaining countries. Gallup of  USA  is a world famous research organization specially doing surveys on various subjects. A recent Gallup report found the security situation of  Bangladesh better than USA or Bangladesh’s neighbouring countries, India and Pakistan.
Only about a fortnight ago, US President Barack Obama himself in his address to the nation expressed his deep worry due to the large scale killing of Americans by gunfire. He described  the killings on almost daily basis as genocide of sorts. He referred  to the firing and killing of 10 students in a college at Oregon state recently and observed that 142 such incidents have occurred since 2012.
A UN  report can be mentioned here, symbolically, to highlight the almost serene conditions that have been noted in Bangladesh for a long time and specially in recent years. For example, it states  that  in USA 14,827 persons were recorded as murdered in 2012 whereas the recorded number of murdered ones in Bangladesh that year was 4,169.  In the same year 50,108 murders were recorded in Brazil, 26,037 in Mexico, 33,817 in Nigeria and 16,259 in South Africa.
The above figures and international comparisons amply show that Bangladesh is  relatively a peaceful and law abiding country. But  the label is sought to be pinned on Bangladesh most undeservedly as a country with seriously adverse  law and order conditions that foreigners should avoid on grounds of their physical safety or
well-being.
We cannot help but ask the question : when the Twin Towers in New York were blown up allegedly by Al-Qudea and many died from that incident, did the world’s countries or Western countries raise safety alerts in relation to visiting  USA at that time? If  not, then why not?  Bombs were blasted in London’s subway by terrorists some years ago in which many died or were injured. But London did not have  to suffer travel alerts like the type that Bangladesh is suffering.
Why Bangladesh has been branded now by Western media as a country dangerously infested by Islamist terrorists  after the deaths of  only ‘two’ foreign nationals ?  Terrorism is a global problem and the nations in the world have been interacting notwithstanding  its pervasiveness. Hardly an entire nation is sought to be delinked from the rest of the world like Bangladesh on  unsubstantiated grounds of  terrorism.
There were and still are Islamist terrorists waiting behind the wings in USA and other countries. But this reality has not led to their quarantine in the family of nations. Why then an exception is being made in case of Bangladesh which enjoys a relatively better law and order position and where terrorism is under firm control. As it is, whatever evidences were seen of the rise of  terrorism in Bangladesh in 2005, were quickly brought under complete control after that period. Bangladesh has been profusely praised internationally in recent years for its success in keeping terrorism under a firm leash. Why then raise this bogey of terrorism in this country ?
In this connection, a very wise remark of the Russian ambassador to Bangladesh comes to mind. He recently told our newsmen that “ two drops from the sky don’t make a rain”. He was obviously alluding to the fact that the deaths of  only two foreigners are not matters to be taken so seriously as to raise such a huge uproar  or alarm about the security situation in Bangladesh.
Notably, India and China are the two most populous countries in the world. The population of these two countries along with that of  Russia form a very big part of entire mankind. If these world’s giants are continuing to interact with Bangladesh at different levels not in the least bothered by our internal security situation, then in this context Western exceptionalism in the matter indeed becomes questionable.

The writer is Associate Editor of theindependent.
E-mail: [email protected]/
[email protected]

 

Completely unjustified red alerts and the like --warning their citizens about the risks of visiting Bangladesh--indulged in by some mainly western countries, not only represent poor policy making on their part but the same is also understandably seen here as unfair and unfriendly acts against this country

�Two drops from the sky don�t make a rain�: Russian ambassador

Ever since the murder of an Italian national in Dhaka quickly followed by a similar killing of a Japanese national in Rangpur, a number of Western countries were seen overreacting to these incidents by hoisting alerts for their citizens suggesting caution in visiting Bangladesh. Of course, prior to these twin murders, the Australian cricket team cancelled their scheduled trip to Bangladesh on the same plea. Notably, right after these developments, Bangladesh government and its security agencies have spared no efforts to ensure the security of foreign nationals staying in Bangladesh. In their several meetings with our foreign ministry officials since these happenings, members of the diplomatic community generally as well as individually, seemed to express their satisfaction due to what things the government of Bangladesh (GOB) have been doing to take care of their security needs. Thus, it was to be expected that these countries would either downsize their alerts or start progressively withdrawing them. But nothing of the sort happened. Rather some of them, especially the USA, UK and Canada upgraded their alerts to higher levels and warned their nationals about the high risks of visiting Bangladesh. Needless to say, such reactions on the part of the Western countries even after admitting that the security situation in Bangladesh presently is not so bad and government here is effectively doing all in its powers not to allow any apprehensions to come true, are likely to be interpreted as deliberate hostile acts against Bangladesh. If for sticking to their irrational stand, relations between Bangladesh and these countries suffer, then who should take the blame for it ? Surely, Bangladesh has not taken any initiative towards this undesirable end. But the excessive sensitivity of these countries is poised to take a heavy toll on our economy. Today, Bangladeshs RMG exports constitute nearly 86 per cent of its total export volumes of commodities. But this singularly most important item in our export basket is facing a very difficult situation from the alert mongering by these countries. Now is the time of the year when buyers in hordes come to Bangladesh to place orders with our garments producers . But an important meeting with buyers representatives was cancelled recently as they requested a cancellation of the meeting citing the security situation in Bangladesh as a pretext. As it is, the arrival of buyers to Bangladesh has come down to a trickle after declaring these alerts and their upgrading . Our garments industries, thus, are faced with a dire situation of drying up of their businesses. Another important and upcoming sector of our economy, tourism, faces a worse predicament as foreign tourists in great number are getting frightened and they are deciding to drop their even firmed up plans to come to Bangladesh. The same can be said about many intending or potential foreign investors. In sum, the issuing of the travel alerts and mindlessly upgrading them, are about to pave the ground for great economic setbacks to occur in this country. Western diplomats-past and present-always emphasise before our audiences that they wish the best to happen to Bangladesh in their hearts. But are the reactions on their part -nowadays- proving to be sincere in this respect? As for the actual security situation prevailing in Bangladesh, it should suffice to say that the same is distinctly better than in the complaining countries. Gallup of USA is a world famous research organization specially doing surveys on various subjects. A recent Gallup report found the security situation of Bangladesh better than USA or Bangladeshs neighbouring countries, India and Pakistan. Only about a fortnight ago, US President Barack Obama himself in his address to the nation expressed his deep worry due to the large scale killing of Americans by gunfire. He described the killings on almost daily basis as genocide of sorts. He referred to the firing and killing of 10 students in a college at Oregon state recently and observed that 142 such incidents have occurred since 2012. A UN report can be mentioned here, symbolically, to highlight the almost serene conditions that have been noted in Bangladesh for a long time and specially in recent years. For example, it states that in USA 14,827 persons were recorded as murdered in 2012 whereas the recorded number of murdered ones in Bangladesh that year was 4,169. In the same year 50,108 murders were recorded in Brazil, 26,037 in Mexico, 33,817 in Nigeria and 16,259 in South Africa. The above figures and international comparisons amply show that Bangladesh is relatively a peaceful and law abiding country. But the label is sought to be pinned on Bangladesh most undeservedly as a country with seriously adverse law and order conditions that foreigners should avoid on grounds of their physical safety or well-being. We cannot help but ask the question : when the Twin Towers in New York were blown up allegedly by Al-Qudea and many died from that incident, did the worlds countries or Western countries raise safety alerts in relation to visiting USA at that time? If not, then why not? Bombs were blasted in Londons subway by terrorists some years ago in which many died or were injured. But London did not have to suffer travel alerts like the type that Bangladesh is suffering. Why Bangladesh has been branded now by Western media as a country dangerously infested by Islamist terrorists after the deaths of only two foreign nationals ? Terrorism is a global problem and the nations in the world have been interacting notwithstanding its pervasiveness. Hardly an entire nation is sought to be delinked from the rest of the world like Bangladesh on unsubstantiated grounds of terrorism. There were and still are Islamist terrorists waiting behind the wings in USA and other countries. But this reality has not led to their quarantine in the family of nations. Why then an exception is being made in case of Bangladesh which enjoys a relatively better law and order position and where terrorism is under firm control. As it is, whatever evidences were seen of the rise of terrorism in Bangladesh in 2005, were quickly brought under complete control after that period. Bangladesh has been profusely praised internationally in recent years for its success in keeping terrorism under a firm leash. Why then raise this bogey of terrorism in this country ? In this connection, a very wise remark of the Russian ambassador to Bangladesh comes to mind. He recently told our newsmen that two drops from the sky dont make a rain. He was obviously alluding to the fact that the deaths of only two foreigners are not matters to be taken so seriously as to raise such a huge uproar or alarm about the security situation in Bangladesh. Notably, India and China are the two most populous countries in the world. The population of these two countries along with that of Russia form a very big part of entire mankind. If these worlds giants are continuing to interact with Bangladesh at different levels not in the least bothered by our internal security situation, then in this context Western exceptionalism in the matter indeed becomes questionable. The writer is Associate Editor of theindependent. E-mail: [email protected]/ [email protected]