US Muslim-Majority City Renames Street After Bangladesh's Khaleda Zia

The first city in the United States with a Muslim-majority population has renamed one of its roads from Carpenter Street to Khaleda Zia Street to honour former Bangladesh Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, reported Desh Rupantor, a Bangladeshi newspaper.

Hamtramck, with a population of 28,433, has the largest concentration of Bangladeshi immigrants in Michigan, and almost 70 per cent of its residents are Muslim. The city also boasts of the country's first and only all-Muslim city council. 

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party Media Cell shared the news on its Facebook page and said that the renaming reflects an international recognition of her leadership and contribution to the country.

The media cell also stated that four councillors of Bangladeshi origin on the Hamtramck City Council made it possible for the change to be possible. 

However, this is not the first time a street was renamed after a Bangladeshi politician. A street in Chicago was named after Ziaur Rahman, a former Bangladeshi president.

The Detroit Free Press reported that 40 per cent of Hamtramck's city is foreign-born. The signs at City Hall are also presented in English, Arabic and Bengali. 

Khaleda Zia, a three-time prime minister and long-time chairperson of the BNP, died on December 30 after a prolonged illness. She was 80. The former Bangladesh PM was laid to rest with full state honours the following day.

Local media reported BNP Standing Committee member Nazrul Islam Khan reading out a written statement on behalf of the party in the presence of Chief Advisor Muhammad Yunus, chiefs of the armed forces and leaders of various political parties in which he highlighted that Khaleda Zia was imprisoned for more than two years from February 8, 2018, in "a false case" and that her health "deteriorated severely" due to a lack of proper medical treatment.

"The nation witnessed that the leader who entered prison on foot emerged from solitary confinement gravely ill," leading Bangladeshi daily Dhaka Tribune quoted Nazrul Islam Khan as saying while reading the statement.

Former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Wednesday slammed certain politicians back home who have been holding her and the Awami League party responsible for the death of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) chairperson Khaleda Zia.

"The claim that I am responsible for her death is categorically untrue. To politicise a death in this way reflects a troubling tendency to replace truth with accusation. At moments like this, Bangladesh deserves dignity, not division," she told IANS.

(With inputs from agencies)