February 10, 2007	Saturday	Muharram 21, 1428

DHAKA, Feb 9: Bangladesh's military has no intention of grabbing power despite a history of coups, the country's army chief was reported as saying.

The military is merely helping the new caretaker government put democracy back on track, private news agency UNB quoted army chief Lieutenant General Moeen U Ahmed as saying late on Thursday.

“The army has no intention of taking over. We are not even running the government,” he told civic and political leaders at Bandarban in southeastern Bangladesh. “But we (would) like to see this government successful as we want to put the country on the right track through the concerted efforts of all,” he said.

The army is widely seen as having engineered events a month ago that led to President Iajuddin Ahmed stepping down as head of the interim government, cancelling disputed elections set for Jan 22 and imposing emergency rule.

The army's intervention came after the United Nations threatened to strip it of its lucrative and prestigious peacekeeping duties if Bangladesh went ahead with one-sided polls, local analysts said.

The emergency rule brought an end to months of opposition protests.—AFP