DHAKA, Nov 15: Stone-throwing activists damaged around 20 vehicles during a general strike in Bangladesh Thursday, the first major street protest against the month-old Islamist-allied government, police and witnesses said.

In Dhaka police said they briefly detained 10 protestors during the half-day stoppage and added that in one incident they used batons to disperse a small group who were throwing stones at passenger buses.

The protest passed off peacefully in the southeastern port city of Chittagong, residents said.

The strike was called by a left-wing group to protest against the prospect of the new government allowing natural gas to be exported to neighbouring India.

The action by the Left Democratic Front (LDF), made up of eight small left-wing political parties, is the first against the government since Prime Minister Khaleda Zia’s four-party coalition won a landslide victory in the country’s October 1 parliamentary election.

The defeated Awami League led by former prime minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed, which claims the elections were rigged and is boycotting parliament in protest, threw its support behind the strike.

Shortly after coming to power, the government said it might allow natural gas to be exported to India.

The issue is controversial as experts say Bangladesh does not have enough reserves for domestic use, let alone for export.

Last month the US oil giant Unocal said it had drawn up 1.2 billion dollar plans for a 1,363 kilometre pipeline from the Bibiyana gas field in northeast Bangladesh to the Indian capital New Delhi.

In the past few days the LDF has staged demonstrations in Dhaka and in Sylhet district, where the 45 square kilometre Bibiyana gas field is located.

Government ministers have said no hasty decision would be taken on exports and thorough studies on the economic and technical consequences would be carried out.

According to official figures the country had a proven recoverable gas reserve of 13 trillion cubic feet, of which more than three trillion has already been extracted.

But Unocal quoted its latest studies to show that Bangladesh’s reserves could be as much as 61 trillion cubic feet.

It also claimed impoverished Bangladesh would receive 3.7 billion dollars in revenue over 20 years and 500 to 700 million dollars in immediate foreign direct investment if the pipeline was approved by the government.—AFP