A senior minister of the Sheikh Hasina cabinet says the Bangladesh government has evidence that former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's administration arranged a "secret meeting" in capital Dhaka in July 2002 between the then Pakistan President and Chief of Army Staff Parvez Musharraf with a jailed secessionist leader wanted by India.
Reiterating his claim that Musharraf had met with United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) leader Anup Chetia, local government minister and ruling Awami League's general secretary Syed Ashraful Islam said: "We've the evidence. We've not made any statement without evidence. I am aware that no comment should be made about a president without any evidence."
His renewed claim came a day after Zia's Bangladesh National Party (BNP) denied the charge, and demanded the proof that Chetia had met with the visiting Pakistani president for 90 minutes after the latter was taken to his suite at Dhaka's Sheraton Hotel from Dhaka Central Jail.
Secretary-general of India's secessionist organization of the North-east, Chetia has been detained in a Bangladesh jail since his arrest in 1998.
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