Workers protest in Bangladesh over factory deaths

Dhaka. Thousands of garment factory workers have protested in the capital, Dhaka, over the death of more than 200 workers in building collapse, as rescuers continued to hunt for survivors, local media have reported.Al Jazeera’s special correspondent, whom we are not naming because of reporting restrictions, said on Thursday that thousands of protesters took to the streets of Dhaka with sticks in their hands chanting slogans such as “we want execution of the garment factory owners”.The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association building office has been attacked, our correspondent said.Workers have blocked a road and indulged in vandalism at some places, the Daily Star newspaper reported.The protests come a day after a garment factory collapsed killing about 200, and there are fears the death toll might go up, even as criticism mounted of foreign firms that source cheap clothes from the country.After visiting the disaster site, Muhiuddin Khan Alamgir, the interior minister, told reporters the building had violated construction codes and that “the culprits would be punished”.More than 1,000 people were injured when the site housing five garment factories on the outskirts of Dhaka imploded on Wednesday, allegedly after managers ignored workers’ warnings that the building had become unstable.Flags flew at half-mast on Thursday as the shell-shocked country declared a day of mourning for the victims of the nation’s worst factory disaster, which highlighted new safety concerns in Bangladesh’s vital garment industry.Army Brigadier General Mohammed Siddiqul Alam Shikder said many people were still trapped in the building, which housed a number of garment factories employing hundreds of people.Workers had said a day earlier that large cracks had developed in the structure.A clearer picture of the rescue operation would be available by the afternoon, Shikder said.Searchers worked through the night to get through the jumbled mess of concrete with drills or their bare hands, passing water and flashlights to those pinned inside the building.