Star Metro - Wounded Bangladesh youth leader dies in Singapore hospital

Masked attackers shot Sharif Osman Hadi, 32, a week ago as he was leaving a mosque in the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, wounding him in the ear.

"Despite the best efforts of the doctors..., Mr Hadi succumbed to his injuries," Singapore's foreign affairs ministry said in a statement, adding that it was assisting Bangladeshi authorities with repatriating his body.

Hadi was a candidate in the February 2026 elections, the first parliamentary polls since a student-led uprising toppled the autocratic rule of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina last year.

He was airlifted to Singapore on Monday for treatment.

In Dhaka, the interim government headed by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus confirmed Hadi's death.

"I express my deepest condolences. His demise is an irreparable loss for the nation," Yunus said.

"The country's march toward democracy cannot be halted through fear, terror, or bloodshed," he said in a televised speech.

The government also announced special prayers at mosques after Friday prayers and a half-day's mourning on Saturday.

Hadi was a senior leader of the student protest group Inqilab Mancha and has been an outspoken critic of India -- Hasina's old ally, where the ousted prime minister remains in self-imposed exile.

- Manhunt for gunmen -

Police in Bangladesh have launched a manhunt for the attackers who shot Hadi, releasing photographs of two key suspects and offering a reward of five million taka (about $42,000) for information leading to their arrest.

Yunus, the 85-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner leading Bangladesh until the February 12 elections, said last Saturday that the shooting was a premeditated attack carried out by a powerful network, without providing a name.

He said that "the objective of the conspirators is to derail the election", adding that the attack was "symbolic -- meant to demonstrate their strength and sabotage the entire electoral process."

Muslim-majority Bangladesh, a nation of 170 million people, will directly vote for 300 lawmakers for its parliament, with another 50 selected on a women's list.

A referendum on a landmark democratic reform package will be held on the same day.

Tensions are high as parties gear up for the polls, and the country remains volatile.

Hasina, convicted in absentia last month and sentenced to death, refused to return to attend her trial. She remains in hiding in India, despite Dhaka's repeated requests for New Delhi to hand her over.

The last elections, held in January 2024, gave Hasina a fourth straight term and her Awami League 222 seats, but were decried by opposition parties as a sham.

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), led by three-time former prime minister Khaleda Zia, is widely tipped to win the upcoming vote.

Zia is in intensive care in Dhaka, and her son and political heir Tarique Rahman, is set to return from exile in Britain after 17 years on December 25.

D.Fraser--SMC