<div><b><span style="font-size: 1rem;">Bangladesh's Foreign Minister Dr Hasan Mahmud on Tuesday (January 30, 2024) said what appeared on Washington Post regarding Nobel laureate Dr Muhammad Yunus was an advertisement, not a statement.&nbsp;</span><br></b></div><div><br></div><div>“Washington Post published it as an advertisement. That is an advertisement, not news. Clearly, it was done by a lobbyist firm,” he told reporters while responding to a question.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>The Foreign Minister said the lobbyist firm also did the same in the past.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>He said Bangladesh’s judiciary is transparent and the government is not a party to Yunus’ case.</div><div><br></div><div>Dr Hasan said the aggrieved people of Yunus’ organization filed the case and the trial is underway in a very transparent way.</div><div><br></div><div>Nobel laureate Dr Muhammad Yunus on Sunday claimed that it was the government, not the workers of his company, who filed the labor law violation case against him.</div><div><br></div><div>When his attention was drawn to the claim, the Foreign Minister on Monday said, “With due respect to him, I would like to say that what he said is not correct.”</div><div><br></div><div>The minister said that the aggrieved workers of Yunus’ company filed the case as they were deprived of what they deserve.</div><div><br></div><div>More than 241 global leaders, including more than 125 Nobel laureates, expressed their concern over the “continuous judicial harassment and potential jailing” of Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Muhammad Yunus in a third open letter to Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, reports UNB</div><div><br></div><div>On January 1, 2024, Professor Yunus and three Grameen Telecom colleagues were convicted of labor law violations, sentenced to six months in jail, and given bail while appeals are considered.&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>