Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen has advised the journalists to ask the US diplomats about their issues, not about Bangladesh.
"Ask [the] USA about their issues and not about Bangladesh. [The] USA is not obligated to govern and help improve this country of ours," he said in a message shared with the local journalists on Wednesday.
The foreign minister, now on an official visit abroad, apparently expressed displeasure over the tendency of journalists in asking questions to foreign diplomats on Bangladesh’s internal affairs.
His retort came a day after US Ambassador to Bangladesh Peter Haas talked about a number of issues on Bangladesh’s next national elections, freedom of press and human rights issues in an open discussion on Tuesday organised by the Diplomatic Correspondents Association, Bangladesh (DCAB), reports UNB.
"If they want freedom of the press, why have they blocked RT TV from airing? If they want accountability, why there has not been any punishment or accountability of the US security forces/police that have killed over a thousand citizens, mostly Black and Hispanic each year?" the message read.
Pointing to the media, Momen said, "Why don't you ask those questions to US Ambassador? If their election process is fair, then why young Americans don't have faith in their election process and hardly vote? Hardly any young Americans vote. Why their vote count is around 25 per cent in each election? Does it represent a participatory election process?"
The foreign minister said local media should rather ask questions to the US ambassador about why they cannot stop such extrajudicial killings in their own country.
Secondly, he said, each year nearly 100,000 of them are missing in the USA and even children are deprived of their reunion with their Hispanic parents.
