February 02, 2008	Saturday	Muharram 23, 1429

DHAKA: Hundreds of Bangladeshi garment workers held angry demonstrations in the capital Dhaka on Friday after one of their colleagues was beaten to death by factory security guards, police said.

More than 500 workers tried to put up barricades on a busy highway that connects the capital with southern and western Bangladesh, but police have cleared the road, deputy commissioner of police Anwarul Islam said.

“They were demanding punishment to the managers and security guards, accusing them of beating their two colleagues. One of them later died in the hospital,” he said.

The workers were found in critical condition in the bathroom of the factory late on Thursday, after they were beaten by guards and officials who suspected that the two were thieves, a government statement said.

Police later arrested the manager and a security guard and filed charges of murder against them, it said.

Garments are Bangladesh’s biggest export earners with sales abroad fetching more than nine billion dollars, or three-quarters of the country’s total export earnings, in the last fiscal year.

But the industry has been hit by a series of protests over low wages and poor working conditions.—AFP