DHAKA, Jan 29: Four opposition activists were killed and nearly 200 people injured on Sunday when police opened fire at large Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) rallies in the southeast.

The shootings happened in the towns of Chandpur and Laksmipur after the party held demonstrations to demand that the government resign in a dispute over electoral reforms, police said.

“They attacked policemen with stones and bricks. We fired back in self-defence. Two BNP activists were killed,” Chandpur police deputy chief Amir Zafar said.

Zakir Ahmed, head of Chandpur police station, said the clashes erupted after 7,000 BNP activists tried to gather at a school ground without first obtaining permission from the authorities.

“We first shot tear gas to disperse them. But they became more violent,” he said, adding 100 people, including 30 policemen, were injured.

In Laksmipur, one person died when police fired rubber bullets and tear gas at more than 4,000 activists after they “became unruly and attacked police with guns”, local police chief Golam Sarwar said.

“Two persons were injured seriously during the clashes. One died on the way to hospital and another was rushed to a clinic in Dhaka in critical condition,” he said, adding 30 others sustained minor injuries.

Sub-inspector Yasmin Ara said the critically injured person, also a BNP activist, later died.

Police also fired rubber bullets and tear gas at thousands of opposition supporters in three other towns in the country’s west, south and north, leaving more than 50 people hurt.

Authorities earlier banned rallies planned on Sunday in the capital Dhaka over fears of violent clashes between the BNP and the ruling Awami League party.

The BNP and its allies had called for a mass demonstration to demand the government stand down.

But the Awami League also said it would hold a rally in central Dhaka on Sunday, sparking the police decision to outlaw any political rallies that day. The two parties have now shifted their programmes to Monday.

The opposition party said 1,200 of its activists were arrested, but the figure could not immediately be confirmed.

The BNP and its key ally Jamaat-i-Islami are demanding an independent caretaker government oversee elections. The government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed scrapped the 15-year-old system last year, saying it contradicted the constitution.

The opposition, led by Ms Hasina’s rival former prime minister Khaleda Zia, says elections will be rigged if held under the current government and without a caretaker system in place.—Agencies